Losing money to an online scam is disorienting, and the panic afterward makes you vulnerable to a second trap: recovery scams that promise to get everything back for a large upfront fee. Spy and Monitor takes the opposite, honest approach. We investigate, trace the money, build an evidence package that banks and authorities can act on, and tell you plainly what is and is not realistic before you spend a penny chasing it. This page explains what we can trace, how crypto recovery actually works, what to do in the first 24 hours, how to avoid recovery scams, and what to expect.
What we investigate
- Cryptocurrency fraud, including fake investment platforms, wallet-draining scams, and fake exchanges.
- Pig-butchering and romance scams that build trust over weeks and then move your money through crypto.
- Investment and trading scams that show fake profits and vanish when you try to withdraw.
- Business email compromise and fraudulent wire transfers.
- Fake recovery services that scammed you a second time after the first loss.
What to do in the first 24 hours
Speed matters more than almost anything else, because funds can sometimes be frozen before they are cashed out. Do these now.
- Stop all contact and stop sending money. If a platform is asking for more fees to release your funds, that is the scam continuing. There are no legitimate fees to unlock your own money.
- Save everything. Transaction IDs, wallet addresses, amounts, dates, screenshots, the website URL, and every message. This is the raw material of the trace.
- Report to your bank or card provider immediately if traditional payment was involved, and request a recall or chargeback. Hours matter here.
- Report to the platform and to the authorities (in the US, the FBI IC3; elsewhere, your national fraud body). A police report number strengthens every later step.
- Get an assessment. The sooner the funds are traced, the better the odds an exchange can act.
How cryptocurrency tracing actually works
Here is the part most pages skip. Cryptocurrency feels anonymous, but most of it is the opposite: every transaction on chains like Bitcoin and Ethereum is public and permanent. Using professional blockchain analytics, we follow your stolen funds hop by hop across wallets, through mixers and bridges where criminals try to break the trail, and toward the point that matters most: the exchange or service where they try to cash out into real money. Those exchanges are regulated, know their customers, and can freeze funds when presented with proper evidence and legal pressure. That is where recovery actually happens, and that is what our evidence package is built to trigger.
Why the cash-out point matters
No one recovers crypto by hacking it back. Recovery happens when a compliant exchange holding the traced funds freezes the account and a bank, court, or law-enforcement order returns the money. Our job is to produce the trace and the documentation that make that possible, and to hand it to the people who hold those powers.
An honest assessment, every time
No one can guarantee recovery, and anyone who does is lying to you. Outcomes depend on how the funds moved, how fast you acted, and whether they landed somewhere reachable. What we can promise is a competent investigation, a clear report, and help pursuing every legitimate avenue. If your case is not realistically recoverable, we will tell you that before you spend money on it, not after.
How to spot a recovery scam
The cruelest scams target people who have already been scammed. Walk away from anyone who guarantees recovery, demands a large upfront fee (especially in gift cards or crypto), contacts you out of the blue claiming to have found your money, or asks for your wallet seed phrase or remote access to your device. A legitimate investigator explains the process, is honest about odds, and never asks for your private keys.
How we work with you
- Confidential intake. You share the transaction details and the story. We assess whether a trace is viable.
- Tracing. We follow the funds on chain to the cash-out points and identify the services involved.
- Evidence package. We document the trail in a form banks, exchanges, and police can act on.
- Pursuit. We help you take it to the exchange, your bank, and the relevant authorities, who hold the freeze-and-return powers.
Act quickly
Older cases are harder but never hopeless, because the blockchain record does not disappear. The sooner you start, the better the odds. If your accounts were also compromised in the scam, our account recovery team can secure them while the investigation proceeds, and if you were threatened, our sextortion and dating-scam support team can help.