The Internet is full of financial scammers who are just waiting for the right moment to scam users and appropriate their money for themselves. It is not always possible to recognize a fraudster immediately; it is necessary to conduct a detailed analysis of trading conditions, legal documentation, and read reviews from real clients.
To make things easier for you, our team has compiled a blacklist of financial companies with signs of being fictitious. These are companies that violate the law and drain user deposits. However, they are not going to bear financial responsibility for the damage caused. Thanks to independent reviews, you will learn what scams charlatans use and how to avoid falling for them.
Inflated minimum amount for exchange
Exorbitant minimum exchange amounts may also indicate dishonest intentions of the owners of the exchanger. Since their goal is to quickly collect money from clients, they can set very high exchange minimums in order to recoup the creation of the site, opening accounts and other expenses as quickly as possible and disappear before negative reviews about them begin to spread en masse online.
Some useful facts
Immediately after its creation, the aggregator united about twenty-five exchangers. In the early years they worked in two popular areas, but soon expanded their field of activity.
The number of organizations on the list has also increased - now clients can choose the appropriate option from four hundred active offers. This makes the aggregator mega popular and in demand. More than 90% of users prefer BestChange.
The functionality of the site also gradually changed. Clients have access to not only comparison of rates and direct exchange, but also a number of other services:
- converter;
- calculator;
- bonuses;
- access to statistics of rates and reserves;
- double exchange option.
Important! By 2022, the aggregator has become a full-fledged and effective tool for the most secure exchange of almost any electronic money.
Bogus reviews
Before sending your funds to the account of a cryptocurrency exchanger, be sure to read the reviews about it. Having a lot of negative reviews is a bad sign. At the same time, if there are several bad reviews about the exchanger, this is not final proof of its dishonesty.
Such messages can be left by competitors or inappropriate, capricious clients. If the service administration answers them politely and reasonably, then most likely these are isolated unpleasant cases, which do not mean that the exchanger is deceiving its users.
The huge number of positive reviews should also be taken seriously. They can be artificially wound.
What you should be wary of:
- IP addresses not from CIS countries (this information is not always displayed);
- persistent attempts to dispute negative reviews;
- use of slang expressions;
- too many reviews in a short time;
- the same phrases and turns.
If you can’t find any reviews about a particular exchanger, it’s better not to use it.
How to avoid losing all your bitcoins to scammers. List of rules
Criminals have come up with many ways to steal cryptocurrency. They create fake exchanges, conduct pre-failed ICOs, and this is not the whole list. Following simple instructions will help you save your money.
Exchangers
You can lose your savings when buying and selling cryptocurrency for fiat money. One of the most popular ways to exchange digital coins for rubles is through exchangers. Traders transfer assets to the service, which sends currency in return, for example, to a bank card or e-wallet.
There are hundreds of exchangers, and scammers may be hiding among them. After receiving funds, they can appropriate them for themselves, explaining this for many reasons. For example, citing a technical problem, a frozen transaction in the blockchain, accusing the user of entering an incorrect address or not pressing the “pay” button.
As a rule, scammers do this in order to gain time and try to deceive other traders before the scheme becomes widely publicized. If for some reason your funds were not paid by the exchanger, you should immediately clarify the reason with technical support. If the answer is suspicious, you should talk about it on special forums and spread the story in the community. This is unlikely to lead to a refund, but perhaps you will prevent other market participants from using this service.
To avoid losing your savings on fraudulent services, you should first study user reviews . Perhaps someone has already encountered delays or non-payments. If this is the case, it is better to refuse the services of the exchanger.
At the same time, you should not pay attention to the same type of positive comments. Perhaps the service itself spoke flatteringly about its services in order to create a good reputation.
You can reduce the risk when using exchangers if you start working with each unfamiliar service with a small amount . This way you can make sure that the service pays out money.
It is also advisable not to use exchangers where the rate is significantly higher than the market rate . Fraudsters can attract new customers this way.
Exchanges
Fraudsters can create not only exchange services, but also exchanges. There are no fewer trading platforms than exchangers, and some of them may exist only to attract cryptocurrency traders and its subsequent theft.
Fraudsters allegedly create a crypto exchange that looks no different from a regular one. You can also create an account on it, top up your wallet, and sometimes even trade. But if you transfer funds to such a site, they will immediately end up in the hands of criminals. In this case, it will no longer be possible to withdraw coins.
Fraudsters can come up with many reasons for refusing to withdraw funds. For example, refer to a technical error or require identity verification. It is impossible to complete this process in such cases; as a rule, documents can be reviewed for months and ultimately not be approved.
If the exchange allows you to create an account and top up your balance without going through verification, but requires it to withdraw funds, it may be a scam . Especially if the site’s website does not warn about such conditions in advance.
In order not to lose money by transferring it to a fraudulent exchange, it is advisable, as with exchangers, to start getting acquainted with each new platform with a small amount . For example, from 10-15 dollars. They can be transferred to the exchange to check if the withdrawals work.
Before using the exchange, it is also advisable to read about it on the Internet and find out in the community whether there have already been suspicious incidents. Another rule is not to use small, unknown platforms, but to trade on popular ones . As a rule, they are time-tested and have a well-deserved reputation. However, this is not a guarantee either.
Fraudulent exchanges, like exchangers, can attract customers with inflated rates. Therefore, it is safer to avoid working with trading platforms where the prices of digital coins are significantly higher than the market ones .
Phishing
Fraudsters also create fake websites of popular exchanges, exchangers and other services. This is done to steal user data. A trader goes to a fake trading platform website and enters his login and password. The information gets to the attackers, after which they can use it to gain access to the user’s real account.
There is another way to cheat. Fraudsters create a fake wallet site to store cryptocurrency. The user goes to it and downloads a fake application. Next, he installs a wallet and transfers cryptocurrency to it, unaware that he is sending funds to scammers. Another risk is that you can download not only a fake wallet, but also a virus that steals data.
Fake sites are usually completely identical to real ones. It is almost impossible to distinguish them externally. But the difference is always in the site address. It may differ from the original extension : it will be, for example, not .io, but .eu or .com. Or the letter I (big i) in the address can be replaced with l (small L). There are many ways to mislead in this way. Therefore, it is extremely important to always check the website address .
You should be especially vigilant when going to the websites of exchanges, exchangers and wallets through search engines. Fraudsters buy advertising in them. Because of this, “search engines” may offer to visit fake sites and show them above real ones in searches.
DeFi, ICO and free cryptocurrency giveaways
In 2022, the field of decentralized finance (DeFi) gained great popularity. Cryptocurrencies related to it rose in price by hundreds and thousands of percent in a short period of time. For example, the YFI token rate from July to September increased by 130,000%, from $32 to $44,000, and has now dropped below $16,000. There are many similar examples.
In this regard, users began to chase DeFi tokens, hoping to buy a coin that will repeat the YFI experience. Fraudsters took advantage of this demand. They have come up with many methods of deception to steal traders' funds.
For example, scammers create fake Defi tokens and add them to decentralized platforms such as Uniswap. Anyone can list a coin on such platforms. As a result, it turns out that a real cryptocurrency and many of its clones are traded on one exchange. If you buy one of them, the funds will go to scammers.
This situation occurred during the ICO of the Polkastarter (POLS) project. On the day of the token, unknown people created 14 clones of this token. Traders invested $30,000 in one of them. To avoid such losses, users of decentralized platforms should search for coins not by name, but by smart contract address . It can be found on the project website or through cryptocurrency aggregators such as Coinmarketcap and Coingecko.
Amid the Defi boom, there has been a new surge in ICOs. Many tokens showed growth of hundreds of percent after the token sale, just like Polkastarter. Because of this, users began to actively participate in ICOs, trying to earn quick money. Fraudsters have found ways to deceive in this case as well. They create a website on which they describe the “sky-high” prospects of the future token and organize an ICO. Users are attracted through social networks, for example, through Telegram. Fraudsters add hundreds of traders to their channel where they advertise the token sale.
According to the terms of the ICO, users are most often asked to undergo identity verification and send Ethereum to a specified address. After this, the project must send its coins to token sale participants and list the asset on exchanges. If the scheme is organized by scammers, then users receive nothing in exchange for their Ethereum, and the project website and its social networks disappear immediately after the ICO. In addition, scammers end up with traders’ personal data.
The problem in this case is that the way ICOs in the DeFi space are conducted by bona fide projects and fraudulent ones is almost identical. It is difficult to distinguish them. Therefore, it is safer to participate in token sales that have received support from specialized media. The media, as a rule, are hesitant to risk their reputation by advertising fraudulent schemes.
When participating in an ICO, you should also check the project’s social networks . If he really develops a product, then there will be many publications in history telling about its development. Scam accounts often only exist for a few days.
The most common method of deception in the field of cryptocurrencies is supposedly free distribution of coins. Fraudsters on behalf of famous personalities offer to send them bitcoins in order to receive two or more times more in return. Attackers often use the identity of Elon Musk and often buy advertising on social networks and other media. If you send funds to participate in such a giveaway, they will be lost.
In July, criminals hacked the Twitter accounts of Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Barack Obama and other politicians and businessmen. Apple and Uber were also affected. On their behalf, the scammers allegedly distributed cryptocurrency and thus embezzled about $120 thousand.
— A trader lost $140,000 in cryptocurrency after connecting to a DeFi service
— The pensioner transferred ₽500 thousand in cryptocurrency to the scammers
— How to identify a promising cryptocurrency. List of rules
You will find more news about cryptocurrencies in our telegram channel RBC-Crypto.
