FSMA Issues Warning Against Suspected Recovery Room Scams and Impersonators

The Financial Services and Markets Authority (FSMA) of Belgium has issued a public warning regarding entities suspected of running recovery room fraud schemes. In these scams, fraudsters specifically approach individuals who have previously lost money to investment fraud, deceptively offering to assist them in recovering their lost assets or recuperating their financial losses. According to the FSMA, victims are typically contacted uninvited via telephone or email, although some find these services through internet searches or social media advertisements. Scammers present themselves under various disguises, including law firms, accounting practices, police agencies, or official financial supervisory authorities. To appear legitimate, they often misappropriate the identity details of genuine organizations and public institutions. The regulator highlighted that recovery room fraudsters typically demand an advance fee to cover fabricated legal expenses, administrative costs, or taxes. Alternatively, some fraudsters claim to offer recovery services for free while requesting remote access to the victim's computer via software such as AnyDesk, allowing them to install spyware or compromise online banking accounts. Scammers may also instruct victims to create and activate wallets on cryptocurrency platforms. In all instances, once funds are transferred, the perpetrators vanish. The FSMA specifically flagged the following entities suspected of unlawful activities: - Cyber Justice (justice-cyberguard.com) - GL Markets (glmarkets.io) - Money Recovery (moneyrecovery.me, moneyrecovery.uk) The regulator also warned that identity theft cases have surged, noting instances where scammers used the names of recognized organizations without authorization, including: - Bybit - European Blockchain Association (operating through blockchain-eba.org, blockchain-wtc.com, and blockchaineba.org) - Ombudsman Financial Services (operating through ombudsman-fs.co) - Sentinel (operating through sentinel-fe.com) The FSMA emphasizes that victims of investment fraud are often targeted a second time by the same perpetrators or by third parties who bought their contact information. Official financial regulators like the FSMA are not authorized to recover lost funds and will never contact victims for this purpose. Consumers are advised to immediately cease all contact if asked for upfront fees, remote computer access, or cryptocurrency wallet setups.