One man managed to scam an entire country out of $130 million by using a simple mobile farming game.
The game in question was called Farm Bank (Çiftlik Bank in Turkish), a seemingly innocent app where you could run your own farm, complete with cows, chickens and goats.
However, there was another side to the app that connected users to real world monetary gains… and losses.
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The brains behind the farm game was Mehmet Aydın, a Turkish man who developed the game for an audience in Turkey, who were able to use in-app coins to purchase livestock and build their game.
They could also pay for things with real money and earn gold bars and exchange them for real money which they could withdraw.
YouTuber, @fern-tv, investigated the case on their channel, explaining to their 1.64 million subscribers that through the app, “you can invest your money in virtual livestock, by doing that you automatically invest in real farms that actually exist and the real production of those real animals are then sold in dedicated farm shops”.
At the time, Turkey’s agriculture was facing a serious struggle and the game gave people an opportunity to support their country’s farming industry.
However, the game was a massive scam and most of the farms Aydın claimed to use were actually inactive.
By 2017, around $250 million was reported to have been invested into the game by users but people began to experience problems with taking out their money.
According to Fern, “In December 2017, [Aydın] suddenly sells his shares in the company.
“A month later, Çiftlik Bank says it has suspended accepting new users, it also stops paying out profits.”
Authorities broke the news in March 2018 that the app was a scam and a criminal investigation was launched.
But the scandal turned into a global manhunt after Aydın fled to Uruguay with millions of dollars.
According to Fern, he “doesn't exactly lay low, he is seen driving around in his Ferrari” but it wasn't until 2020, when authorities suspected he was hiding out in Brazil.
In 2021, he was finally caught in Sao Paulo, where he was arrested and flown back to Turkey.
Now, the fraudster is facing a total of 89,000 years in prison.
While Aydın had left with $80.5 million, he returned to Istanbul with just $13 in his wallet.
Taking to the YouTube comment section, one viewer wrote: “‘Sounds too good to be true’ is a tale as old as time.”
Another said: “Really sad to hear about these stories that start off with a great idea. If someone with true good intentions and the money to follow through with it had taken up this concept it could really help a ton of people.”
And a third joked: “I got my next million dollar idea.”