Crypto Info-Scamming Worth Millions: How Oleksandr Orlovskyi’s Financial Freedom Academy Tricks People into Paying for 'Education'

Oleksandr Orlovskyi’s Financial Freedom Academy continues to extort money from people.

In 2024 year crypto scammers collected at least 9,9 billion U.S. dollars. As Oleksa Shtuchnyi writes in his article for the CRIME and [high-profile cases] projects, analysts at the Chainalysis firm concluded that this amount could rise as new illicit addresses linked to financial fraud are identified throughout the year.

Although preliminary estimates point to some decline in scammers’ revenues in 2024 year, the real figures could prove record-breaking. Analysts note an average increase in fraudulent revenues of 24% between annual reporting periods. Thus, victims’ losses from crypto scams may exceed 12 billion dollars by year’s end.

One of the most popular schemes remains high-yield investment fraud (HYIS), based on the principles of a financial pyramid. In 2024 year this scheme accounted for 50,2% of all funds obtained by scammers, although its share of total fraud declined by 36,6% compared to 2023 year.

Chainalysis researchers overlooked a type of fraud known as crypto infoscamming, better known in our region as crypto info-gypsy scams (where for a large sum you are promised to be taught how to get rich quickly and effortlessly on crypto).

Info-gypsy ads increasingly appear on social networks and messengers. So it’s obvious that the reach of their nets is growing, as are their profits.

Most aggressively promoting his “services” is a figure familiar to our readers, Oleksandr Orlovskyi, the nominal founder of Financial Freedom Academy (also known as the FFA community). And we didn’t mention him again by accident.

Under the FFA brand Orlovskyi promotes several infoscam “products.” Until last November their names began with “FFA Crypto,” but then Oleksandr Orlovskyi swapped the words and it became “Crypto FFA.” This seemingly senseless rebranding was done after the National Securities and Stock Market Commission (NSSMC) added Orlovskyi’s FFA Crypto, FFA Crypto RISE and FFA Crypto Capitalist to the list of dubious investment projects—i.e., those showing signs of financial pyramids.

In June of last year

In December of 2024

Because the NSSMC’s activities are widely covered by influential media, it was much easier for Orlovskyi to change the scam’s name. If potential gullible investors search Google for, say, “FFA Crypto Capitalist,” they’ll find the regulator’s warning. But if they type “premium investment program Capitalist” into the search bar, they may come across the “updated” project that supposedly has no problems.

Moreover, after the NSSMC’s “black mark,” banks and payment systems may block payments related to FFA Crypto. But Crypto FFA is perfectly clean for them—until the regulator gets around to Orlovskyi again.

However, changing the signboard doesn’t seem to help much, so Oleksandr Orlovskyi “counterattacked” the Commission in court. On 19 March sole proprietor Orlovskyi Oleksandr Oleksandrovych filed a suit against the NSSMC with the Kyiv District Administrative Court. The plaintiff asks the servants of Themis to:

"Recognize as unlawful the actions of the National Securities and Stock Market Commission regarding the implementation of unfounded control (supervision) of sole proprietor Orlovskyi O.O. and the inspection (analysis) of his activities, specifically the maintenance of the so-called ‘list of dubious investment projects’ with respect to the inclusion (entry) of the Plaintiff’s educational services, namely: the training programs FFA Crypto / FFA Crypto RISE / FFA Crypto CAPITALIST in the list of dubious investment projects."

We will tell next time how a financial pyramid is actually built under the “umbrella” of FFA Crypto’s pseudo-educational projects and how it works. How FFA operators squeeze money out of “clients” through front persons can be read here. By the way, they de facto encourage them to cooperate with residents of the aggressor country.

For now it’s worth paying attention to the kinds of ads Oleksandr Orlovskyi uses to lure Ukrainians thirsty for quick profit into his nets. This is a textbook example of manipulative marketing used by info-gypsies to attract new victims to dubious financial schemes.

Here’s how Oleksandr Orlovskyi uses psychological triggers and dangerous promises:

1. The illusion of easy money with no effort

Phrases like:

create the illusion of passive income with no effort.

Why this is deception?

2. Manipulation of the term “investing”

3. Social proof and “profitable cases”

Orlovskyi refers to “profitable investor cases.” This is a classic social-proof technique that works like this:

But here lies a hidden trap

4. Using the word “Capitalist” as a brand

The name Capitalist creates a sense of legality and professionalism, although it’s just a marketing trick. In reality:

However, besides the minds of his “flock,” the crypto preacher Oleksandr Orlovskyi apparently decided to “hack” their gadgets as well.

For about half a year our team recorded malvertising-type malware on the https://orlovskyi.com website—the flagship internet platform of Orlovskyi (the last occurrence was in March this year).

Malvertising (short for malicious advertising) is a form of cyberattack in which malicious software (a virus, trojan, spyware, cryptominer, etc.) is distributed through online advertising.

Given the long time this “glitch” was present on Orlovskyi’s site, it’s unlikely that an external hacker “screwed” the malware onto it. Most likely, the team of this “crypto guru” did it. Why?

Theoretically, Orlovskyi and his retinue could obtain several types of benefit from using malvertising:

Whatever purpose Orlovskyi’s sect might have used this “gadget” for, a spicy legal nuance arises. The use of software similar to malvertising in Ukraine is a criminal offense.

For example, if users suffer attacks or data theft through malvertising, this can be qualified as interference with the operation of computer systems. This is Article 361 of the Criminal Code.

If Orlovskyi and Co. simply spied on visitors to, for example, more effectively "sell" them their “information product,” that would be Articles 361-2, called “Unauthorized sale or distribution of restricted-access information stored in electronic computing machines."

To be continued.