Todd Burkhalter promised big returns. His victims didn’t realize they were too good to be true.

It was a rough year for Ponzi schemes. In 2009, the recession unraveled nearly four times as many of the investment scams as those that fell apart in 2008, with "Ponzi" becoming a buzzword again ...

What once relied on word-of-mouth and text messages has now evolved into sleek websites, crypto buzzwords, and social media influencers. But no matter the packaging, the outcome is often the same: ...