Crypto-related scams emerged as a major and fast-growing threat across Africa in 2025, with fraudsters increasingly using deepfake technology and fake licensing claims to defraud investors, according to the INTERPOL African Cyberthreat Assessment Report 2026, published in June.

The report said the region's crypto economy was valued at USD 205 billion in transactions between July 2024 and July 2025, making it an increasingly attractive target for fraud. Nigeria accounted for USD 92 billion of that total, while South Africa's clearer regulatory environment attracted both legitimate investors and criminal actors.

Among the schemes identified was CryptoBridge Exchange (CBEX), which the report said falsely claimed US licensing to defraud African investors. Other platforms, named "Optcoin" and "AfriQuantumX," used deepfake videos of national leaders and social media influencers to promote fake AI-powered trading platforms.

The report also detailed a major enforcement success, INTERPOL's Operation Serengeti 2.0, which dismantled a Zambia-based network responsible for an estimated USD 300 million in losses affecting 60,000 victims, leading to 15 arrests.

Separately, the report highlighted the rise of "romance baiting," which it described as "a hybrid of emotional manipulation and investment fraud" that "became increasingly industrialized." Victims, often recruited through Facebook, were moved to WhatsApp for video calls, where they were coerced into sending money under false pretences. The report said many of these operations were linked to scam centres, described as "facilities where victims are held against their will and forced to participate in fraud."

On the growing sophistication of these schemes, the report noted that the "integration of AI into scam operations, generating personalized lures, voice clones, and fake testimonials, has made detection increasingly difficult for both platforms and victims."

It added that the government response so far "has been fragmented," with "the lack of cross-border coordination and digital evidence-sharing" allowing these networks to persist.