The New Hampshire Treasury has warned about crypto scammers impersonating agency representatives.

The agency warned that fraudsters are using fake phone numbers of real government agencies and are trying to convince interlocutors that their confidential data has been compromised. To prevent money theft due to financial data leakage, scammers ask people to withdraw all their funds from bank accounts and then transfer them in bitcoins to a “safe account” that is actually controlled by the perpetrators.

The Treasury emphasized that it does not request payments or transfers in bitcoins. Therefore, upon receiving such phone calls, it is advisable to immediately terminate the conversation. Local residents are recommended to report incidents to the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) at the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and local law enforcement.

Cryptocurrency scammers have become more active due to the fact that the state of New Hampshire recently became one of the first US states to pass a law to create a strategic reserve in bitcoins. Governor Kelly Ayott (Kelly Ayotte) signed a bill allowing the state treasury to allocate up to 5% of the state budget to bitcoins and other digital assets whose market capitalization exceeds $500 billion.

In January, the FBI reported that over the course of a year, the agency was able to save more than 4,300 potential victims from cryptocurrency fraud — with the help of law enforcement, they managed to preserve about $285 million.