Scams are exposed to regulators and they step in and shut them down. I think that is their job. Amazingly, investors who ignored the telling signals of the scam are of course the first to cry foul at the regulators. many actually claimed some massive conspiracy when in reality it was nothing more than a simple scam.
I look at Spongetech as a perfect example. So many took what the company said as being gospel and when it was outed as a con, it was of course the regulators fault that so many lost money. those same people never learned as they went on to more and more scams and protected the con's.