The life of a fraudster isn’t something that Marco has just recently adopted, but a habit he had developed a few years back when he was involved in other marketing schemes, prior to the emergence and his introduction to crypto-currencies
(please note, this is just what we managed to unearth. There may well be other scams that Marco participated in that we’re unaware of).
To provide an insight into the origins of Marco’s shady dealings, we must look into his professional background to see how he used to ply his trade, & what led him to become involved in illegal activities.
Going back to his native country of Italy, Marco started off working in telecommunications & mainstream media. It was within these roles that he was learning about the power of ‘content’ which would later be the foundation of his first scheme that would involve the misuse of data via a subscription model around SMS campaigns. Prior to this, he would open companies in various parts of the world, such as Italy, Malta & Dubai, from where he currently resides and orchestrates his fraudulent business.
It was just over 10 years ago when Marco started one of his companies, Top Global Services, where he was CEO up until February earlier this year. While we don’t know very much about the company, what we have learnt from looking into his LinkedIn Profile is that the company went bankrupt, with Marco laying the blame at the feet of his clients:
Over 2 years ago, Marco started Top Global SMS where he quickly learned how to obtain data, & misuse it. A popular example of how an SMS scam works is to take a company like a courier firm that would send a text out claiming they have to collect a package. The text would include a link that once clicked, launches software that obtains information from the individual’s phone.
A tweet from a courier text scam victim, shared last year
This illegal attempt to solicit information is also known as ‘smishing’, a combination of SMS & phishing. Furthermore, the fake SMS is sent to all contacts that are saved to the phone. This was very common during lockdown, which coincidentally, was exactly the same time Marco launched this SMS company.
Marco boasted of his very extensive database on LinkedIn rather soon after launching his company:
What is another coincidence is that in Italy, paid SMS subscriptions are legal as long as the user consents. However, the scammer illegally gains the consent via banner ads that prompt the device owner to subscribe to a list where the scammers’ code is deployed and their consent is forged. This triggers a subscription through an automated billing process. We don’t know how many victims fell to Marco’s SMS scam during the time he was running Top Global SMS, but if the numbers he mentions on his LinkedIn comment above are anything to go by, you could imagine how many he managed to dupe. The company closed in February, 2022, around about the same time the pandemic was coming to an end.
It was within this period that Marco founded AIDIA FZ, the company at the centre of his latest crypto-currency scam where we have proof of dozens of investors falling victim to his elaborate charade where he managed to defraud well into the millions, funding his family and his lavish lifestyle in Dubai.
Marco would gain the confidence in his targets by sharing his personal ID to show he is a real person and that his company exists. He would do this with documents such as his passport. Here are a couple of images where he has sent them to investors, almost to save them from having to do any further background checks on him:
According to the latest reports on his whereabouts
He was last seen in a Fujairah jail as the authorities caught up with him after a victim filed a police report against him. Here is an image he shared with another investor:
For more information on this latest update and more, please visit the ‘Updates’ page of this site.
Please note, it is highly likely that there are more individuals who may have been impacted by Marco’s scheming methods that we are unaware of. Please contact us via email to: [email protected] if you or someone you know has been a victim of a Marco Oliva scam.