With some needed consolidating activity in these crypto markets, so the scams

in #crypto4 years ago (edited)

There are many scams; keep safe out there


You get on a discord server and out of the blue some user flashes you with a message. To help in these corona times, here's some 0.7 bitcoin. Here's what you must do next. And so begins the scam at tevBit.com


And if you go to https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5209679.new#new, you will see that this particular type of scam has been around a while and in 2020 July, making a 'comeback'. What type of scam makes a 'comeback'? Possibly one that has been deployed successfully and has affected victims before.

Here's how it works: the perpetrators promise you some bitcoin and direct you to an exchange to claim your supposed benefits but on getting there and registering, you find that you are unable to collect your winnings without fulfilling some other condition; usually the contribution of 0.2 bitcoin (about USD 200 on average) before withdrawals work. If you send it an experimental sum at any time, those sums become locked in too and subject to the same ransom.

The true object of this scheming scam is to withhold your BTC. Even the cipher text scam 'BTC' promised is something implemented in software alone with "string" variables, [smile here], no substance or value to the code. You can find this out by teasing out the sham address on the exchange (tevBit.com) and trying to find out what the address holds by using a blockchain explorer. When I did this, nothing showed. The fake BTC wasn't there.

This reminds of the advance fee fraud type of scam popularised by some of my countrymen/women. Whatever happens, don't be a victim.