A new spate of lawsuits suggests that despite legislation and prosecutions by foreign governments, alleged investment fraud remains a lucrative business in Israel, with local law enforcement doing little to crack down on suspected online scammers.
Among the recent lawsuits — filed in Israel by alleged victims from countries including Australia, Azerbaijan, Germany, Holland, Hong Kong, India, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Norway, Singapore, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom and the United States — are claims against individuals who used to sell binary options investments and pivoted to other financial instruments. When the binary options industry was outlawed by the Knesset in October 2017 for being irredeemably fraudulent, some of the individuals involved began selling foreign exchange bets, contracts for difference (CFDs), and cryptocurrency investments. Israeli law enforcement has indicted almost no online fraudsters, despite the fact that the industry employed thousands of people and allegedly stole billions of dollars.
Prosecutors in a European country recently told The Times of Israel that while investment scam call centers are now located throughout Europe, time after time investigators have found that a scam website’s service providers are Israeli or that fraud proceeds end up in Israeli bank accounts or in the bank accounts of individuals of Israeli origin.
Many of the plaintiffs are over 50 and some were allegedly…