The very famous Kim Kardashian recently promoted a highly speculative “digital currency” to her 200 million Instagram followers. Authorities have warned about this and others.
The U.K. financial watchdog has criticized ads promoting cryptocurrencies by social media stars and has called for stricter regulation of such propaganda.
Life is increasingly happening online and “we cannot allow online businesses to engage in practices that we would not tolerate in other businesses,” said Charles Randell, head of the top Treasury (FCA). What is needed are rules that protect people from fraud and investment gimmicks.
The FCA chief was mainly referring to American reality TV star Kim Kardashian’s advertising posts on the internet service Instagram. In June, Kardashian posted a promotional post on Instagram asking her followers to join the “Ethereum Max community.” Kardashian has more than 200 million followers on Instagram.
The devil is in the details.
However, Randell emphasized that Ethereum Max has nothing to do with Ethereum, the second-largest cryptocurrency after Bitcoin. Rather, it is a speculative digital currency that was recently created by unknown people. In fact, he didn’t know if his whole plan was a hoax. However, more and more scammers are paying celebrities to promote their interests and projects.
Randall complained that Kardashian officially flagged her post as an ad, but there were no rules requiring her to explain the background to Ethereum Max.
At the same time, Kardashian’s contribution has also attracted a very large audience. Experts warn that cryptocurrency operations can cause losses, as well as susceptibility to fraud and hacking.
