DUBAI: The relaunch of Dubai Coin, a digital currency that it was claimed could be used to buy goods, is a scam, Dubai’s government said today.
“Dubai Coin cryptocurrency was never approved by any official authority,” the government said on its Twitter account. “The website promoting the coin is an elaborate phishing campaign that is designed to steal personal information from its visitors.”
Dubai Coin's relaunch was fake and both its name and logo had been used fraudulently in a news release and website, according to ArabianChain Technology, the UAE-based blockchain start-up that set up Dubai Coin in 2017.
Dubai Coin was “relaunched” this week amid claims it had official backing, The National newspaper reported. The press release distributed by PRNewswire has since been removed from its website.
Its value rose 14-fold from below $0.09 per coin on Tuesday to as high as $1.35 on Wednesday, according to prices on crypto.com.
ArabianChain, which owns the Palmex cryptocurrency exchange, stopped working on Dubai Coin in 2019 to concentrate its resources on Palmex.
“We haven’t made such an announcement, please be cautious,” the company said on Twitter. A website offering the coins for sale, which is no longer operational, was described by ArabianChain as a “scam.”
