https://x.com/GetTheDailyDirt/status/2001345929815699779
USA CRIME NEWS: See how a big convenience store chain became a hub for crypto scams
CRYPTO ATM: Just inside the front door of a Circle K convenience store, the district manager glared at a small kiosk.
CNN: Yet another elderly victim had just fed thousands of dollars into the device after being tricked by a scammer.
“I hate these machines,” the manager told police in Niceville, Florida, according to body-camera footage of the September incident.
“I’d like to get them out of the stores.”
He’s not alone.
Thousands of Americans, many of them retirees on limited budgets, lost more than a quarter of a billion dollars this year to scams that fooled them into using crypto
ATMs – machines that turn cash into hard-to-recover cryptocurrency.
And scores of those victims were fleeced by scammers inside stores owned by Circle K, one of the crypto ATM industry’s biggest corporate partners.
A joint investigation by CNN and the International Consortium of Investigative
Journalists found that Circle K has made millions by renting space to crypto ATMs – even amid mounting evidence that the machines are playing a key role in international fraud schemes that exasperate local police called repeatedly to the same stores.
CNN and ICIJ reviewed more than 150 cases of crypto ATM scams at Circle K stores and spoke to 17 employees who said they witnessed – and sometimes tried to prevent – the fraud while at work, including one who saw a man attack a machine with a sledgehammer to try to retrieve his stolen money.
Some said they have discussed the problem with management but have seen little response.
Circle K policy is, ‘It’s not our machine, it’s not our problem,’ but I see it all too often,” Debbie Joy, an assistant manager in Port Orange, Florida said during a city council meeting in April in which she received an award for stopping one of the scams in progress.
Even some of Circle K’s own staffers have been duped into taking thousands from their stores’ safes and feeding the money into crypto ATMs, police reports show.
At one location in Indiana, store managers went so far as posting a prominent sign behind the register cautioning employees.
“Scam Alert,” it reads: “Don’t save money in the register to drop in the Bitcoin machine.”Circle K has alerted staffers repeatedly in emails and trainings about crypto ATM scams, multiple employees told CNN and ICIJ.
“While we train and educate our employees to recognize common and emerging financial scams, they do not handle or oversee customer transactions at self‑service cash ATMs or Bitcoin Depot terminals available in our stores, which are owned and managed solely by third parties,” a Circle K spokesperson said.
Despite all those warnings, the chain’s owner this year re-upped its deal with crypto ATM firm Bitcoin Depot.
That arrangement pays Circle K rent, which can generate thousands in revenue at each store annually.
Critics and victims, including one who sued the chain last year, say Circle K is putting profits over safety.
“We really desperately at this moment need to get the plug pulled on these Bitcoin ATMs to make the scams harder,” said Nathan VanCleave, a police sergeant in Evansville, Indiana who has worked crypto-scam cases.
“Right now, the roadblock is the big corporations, gas stations that are hosting these Bitcoin ATMs.”
A recent investigation revealed how crypto ATM companies profit from rampant and growing scams by frequently marking up the price of cryptocurrency by 20% to 30% or more on transactions, including the illicit ones.
Multiple state attorneys general and other authorities have alleged a large share of major crypto ATM firms’ transactions involve scams and that the companies have failed to protect consumers.
Those companies dispute those allegations and say they have extensive safeguards in place to protect users, such as prominent fraud warnings on their machines.
Bitcoin Depot also requires IDs for transactions, provides live customer support and maintains a team that regularly assists law enforcement with investigations, the company said in a statement.
Companies like Circle K also profit to a lesser extent, with revenue from the crypto ATM industry flowing to retailers that get paid to host the machines in their stores.
More than 30,000 crypto ATMs sit inside gas stations, smoke shops, grocery stores and other sites across the US, according to Coin ATM Radar, which tracks the devices.
Circle K, which hosts crypto ATMs at more than 750 of its stores, according to Bitcoin Depot records, is the company’s largest corporate partner.
Circle K’s parent company operates about 7,000 US stores.
A spokesperson for Circle K said the company is committed to providing safe, secure experiences for customers.
“As cryptocurrency continues to grow in popularity, like virtually any financial instrument, it is subject to criminal scams that begin outside of retail locations, long before targets approach a crypto ATM,” the spokesperson said.
“As a responsible retailer, we work closely with business partners like Bitcoin Depot to ensure their services consistently meet our standards, regulatory requirements and customers’ needs and expectations.”
Some employees of the chain, though, say Circle K is harming its own customers by keeping the machines.
“Morally, Circle K should kick them out,” Joy, the assistant manager in Florida, said in an interview. “Do the right thing.”‘Big hit’
Last year, a pop-up on Steve Beckett’s laptop warned him his computer had been hacked.
When the 67-year-old retiree called an apparent number for tech support, the people who answered spun an elaborate story that he needed to secure his accounts by transferring cash through a nearby crypto ATM.
Beckett said amid a dizzying series of instructions and demands, one detail gave him comfort – that the person directed him to a Circle K, a familiar business.
“You think everything in a convenience store is for your convenience,” Beckett told CNN.Only after feeding $7,000 from his bank account into the crypto ATM did Beckett learn he’d been scammed.
It’s a story that’s become familiar since 2021, when Circle K and Bitcoin Depot announced a partnership.
Bitcoin Depot’s pitch to potential retail partners has been straightforward: Host the ATMs and get extra revenue as well as increased foot traffic.
An archived page on the company’s website pledged the partnerships carry “Zero risk. Zero cost. Monthly revenue.
”When the company cut an exclusive deal with Circle K, Bitcoin Depot’s founder, Brandon Mintz, touted how it would help customers buy crypto “instantly in a familiar environment in their local neighborhood."
There was also a clear benefit to the convenience store chain. At the outset, Circle K received as much as $700 a month in rent per location, according to two people familiar with the deal.
That amount could vary by location and later was reduced, though many machines still brought in hundreds of dollars per month.
In comments to a trade publication the following year, a then-vice president at Circle K described the crypto ATMs as a “big hit” and added, “Feedback from customers has been well received and overwhelmingly positive.
”But the partnership also led to a wave of scams at Circle Ks – part of an exploding national trend of crypto ATM fraud.
The FBI received more than 12,000 scam complaints this year about crypto ATMs, which enable criminals to rapidly transfer stolen funds to digital wallets based in foreign countries less likely to cooperate with US law enforcement.
Victims lost more than $330 million between January and November.
Police reports reviewed by CNN and ICIJ show victims have been led to Circle Ks around the country – from Atlanta and Las Vegas to small towns off interstates in the South and Midwest.
Scammers stole up to tens of thousands of dollars in some cases.
The police reports reflect the variety of methods scammers used to draw victims into Circle Ks – from pretending to be tech support to posing as law enforcement or even politicians.
In August, authorities responded to a Circle K in Pace, Florida, and found an 86-year-old woman at the crypto ATM who said she had “sent money to Trump for his campaign debts.”
An officer advised she had likely been scammed because “the president would not contact someone through Telegram.”
Some machines have been repeatedly used for cons. At least a dozen people in Prescott, Arizona, reported sending money to scammers at a single Circle K’s machine since last year, records show.
Police in some cities have tried warning victims in Circle Ks.
After a woman in Mundelein, Illinois, lost nearly $10,000 to a scammer last year, a police officer stopped by the Circle K that housed the crypto ATM – and then found that the machine already had a warning on it from his department advising victims to beware of the fraud.
Scam victims have found limited success in suing crypto ATM firms to recover their money.
Iowa’s state Supreme Court earlier this year, for instance, ruled Bitcoin Depot wasn’t liable because scammers had convinced a victim to bypass company requirements that users only send funds to crypto wallets they control.
At least one victim has turned to the courts alleging Circle K was also responsible.Glenda Mooneyham, a South Carolina widow in her 70s, was duped into depositing $30,000 in a Bitcoin Depot ATM inside a Circle K in November 2023.
She sued the store, alleging the company was “expressly aware” that the crypto ATMs were used for scams and that its employees “made no meaningful effort to intervene” to stop the incident.
A federal judge earlier this year granted motions by Circle K and Bitcoin Depot to move the matter into arbitration because Mooneyham had accepted Bitcoin Depot’s terms of service while using the machine.
Bitcoin Depot said in a statement arbitration provisions are intended to provide efficient paths to resolve individual disputes.
"Unfortunately, bad actors attempt to misuse many types of financial self-service terminals, including traditional ATMs, this issue is not unique to any one retailer. Our focus is on ensuring partners understand the safeguards in place and that customers receive consistent warnings and support designed to help prevent scams before they occur,” the statement added...
Please Read Much More Here:
https://www.cnn.com/2025/12/17/us/crypto-atm-scams-circle-k-invs-vis
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