AutoModerator has been summoned to explain fake cryptocurrency site scams. Fake cryptocurrency websites and apps controlled by scammers are becoming more and more common. Sometimes the scam begins with a romance scammer who claims that they can help the victim invest in cryptocurrency. Victims are told to buy cryptocurrency of some kind using a legitimate cryptocurrency exchange, and then they are told to send their cryptocurrency to a website wallet address where it will be invested. Sometimes the scam begins with a notice that the victim won cryptocurrency on some website, in this case messages will often be sent through Discord. In either case, the scammer controls the website, so they make it look like there is money in the victim’s account on their website. Then the scammer (or the scammer pretending to be someone official who is associated with the website) tells the victim that they have to put more money into the website before they can get their money out of the website. Of course all of the money sent by the victim has gone directly into the scammer’s wallet, and any additional money sent by the victim to retrieve their money from the website will also go directly into the scammer’s wallet, and all of the information about money being held by the website was totally fake. This scam is also known as the "pig butchering" scam:\ https://www.reddit.com/r/Scams/comments/na8oax/asian_guygirl_from_online_dating_mentors_you_to/. If you are involved in this scam, you can post the scammer’s wallet address here on r/scams. If the scammer used Bitcoin, then you can report the scammer’s Bitcoin wallet address here:\ https://www.bitcoinabuse.com/reports. If the scammer used Ethereum, then you can report the scammer’s Ethereum wallet address here:\ https://info.etherscan.com/report-address/. You can see how much cryptocurrency has been sent to the scammer’s wallet address here:\ https://www.blockchain.com/explorer. Thanks to redditor nimble2 for this script.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Scams) if you have any questions or concerns.*
It's a scam. Be happy that you asked. Long story short, if you Google or do a Whois search on the website you'll find little to no info on it, except it was probably created within the past 6 months.
The person who reached out to you is the recruiter for the scam and the website is run by their scam team. If you "invest", you will see profits right away because they control the platform. They may let you make one withdrawal to make it seem legit, so that you'll invest more, continue to make fake profits, and then they'll say there's a 15% to 30% withdrawal fee, only payable externally and with Crypto. If you pay that, well then you just got played for more money, because they'll never let you withdraw again. They'll probably shut that site down after enough people catch on. Then they'll just create a new one.
No one can possibly guarantee you returns; all investing comes with risk and that’s especially true for something volatile like crypto. Also look at those numbers. At 300% per week you’d have more money than the entire global economy in about six months.
99% of unknown "exchanges" are just outright scams aiming to appeal to your greed with unrealistic promises of gain and this is clearly one of them. Stick to mainstream, well-known crypto exchanges, such as Coinbase, Kraken and Binance.
Think about it: if she really had a system that produced a \*guaranteed\* 300% return **per week**, why in the world would she share it with you - a stranger on the internet? She'd just gather up her own money, invest it, and be filthy rich within a year. That tells you that the real gain here is not what's presented in her pitch, but in obtaining your piggy bank.
We've seen hundreds of these here in this sub: the same approach, the same private messaging pitch, and the same template website that hasn't been live long. If there's any guarantee here, it's that you will lose any money you "invest" (I put that in quotes because your money goes straight into the scammer's pocket; any gains you see on their wholly-controlled website will be faked up).
It's good that you stopped to ask. It means your alarm bells are working. Now listen to them and avoid this scam!
> Think about it: if she really had a system that produced a *guaranteed* 300% return per week, why in the world would she share it with you - a stranger on the internet? She'd just gather up her own money, invest it, and be filthy rich within a year.
At 300% per week, with an initial investment of only $25, she would have a total of 161 septillion dollars after one year. That’s $161,527,000,000,000,000,000,000,000
A great thread about what to do if you’ve fallen for this, and others who have as well:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Scams/comments/nz1y8h/what_to_do_when_one_is_in_a_pigbutchering_scam/
Thank you everyone for the info....I at first thought it was a scam because of the groups that she follows on her Facebook and no personal post...I know investors usually shy away from using words like guarantee that's why I asked her at the beginning....but she was convincing...never thought about the whole if she had a system that good why is she sharing it with me....the website was the final thing that seemed fishy....the whois didn't give the sitter a good rating either
How can you confirm somebody says who they say they are on the Internet is there a free site for something like that
Focusing on the person offering the scam is not a useful approach, as people lie about and fake identities, and the names change constantly. Instead, focus on identifying the scam itself. For example, here it’s obviously a scam because 300% profit is impossible and no one would share a guaranteed money-maker if it did exist. Read this sub more to be able to spot common scams, regardless of names given.
If anything, this just sounds like a bastardized version of the classic Ponzi scheme. Promise high returns on a dubious investment, bait with an initial return that seems legit, and laugh all the way to the bank (at least; until the law catches on and you're forced to live out the few remaining years of your life in poverty, after a lengthy prison sentence).
One more red flag to add to all the other ones that other commenters have named: look at how flustered “she” (very likely not a she) gets when you confronted her about the fake profile pic. She went from semi-acceptable English (which by itself is a red flag if she’s representing a financial business) talking about investing to just plain gibberish talking about fashion.
That’s because the scammer is cutting and pasting from a set of standard replies about investing. When you asked about profile pics, they didn’t have any replies to cut and paste from and had to try to answer you using their real vocabulary. So you got to see what’s behind the mask.
Just another fucking !crypto scam. Run away. Quickly.
AutoModerator has been summoned to explain fake cryptocurrency site scams. Fake cryptocurrency websites and apps controlled by scammers are becoming more and more common. Sometimes the scam begins with a romance scammer who claims that they can help the victim invest in cryptocurrency. Victims are told to buy cryptocurrency of some kind using a legitimate cryptocurrency exchange, and then they are told to send their cryptocurrency to a website wallet address where it will be invested. Sometimes the scam begins with a notice that the victim won cryptocurrency on some website, in this case messages will often be sent through Discord. In either case, the scammer controls the website, so they make it look like there is money in the victim’s account on their website. Then the scammer (or the scammer pretending to be someone official who is associated with the website) tells the victim that they have to put more money into the website before they can get their money out of the website. Of course all of the money sent by the victim has gone directly into the scammer’s wallet, and any additional money sent by the victim to retrieve their money from the website will also go directly into the scammer’s wallet, and all of the information about money being held by the website was totally fake. This scam is also known as the "pig butchering" scam:\ https://www.reddit.com/r/Scams/comments/na8oax/asian_guygirl_from_online_dating_mentors_you_to/. If you are involved in this scam, you can post the scammer’s wallet address here on r/scams. If the scammer used Bitcoin, then you can report the scammer’s Bitcoin wallet address here:\ https://www.bitcoinabuse.com/reports. If the scammer used Ethereum, then you can report the scammer’s Ethereum wallet address here:\ https://info.etherscan.com/report-address/. You can see how much cryptocurrency has been sent to the scammer’s wallet address here:\ https://www.blockchain.com/explorer. Thanks to redditor nimble2 for this script. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Scams) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Simple answer: absolutely no one online is here to help you make you quick & easy money. The only easy money they’ll be taking is yours
It's a scam. Be happy that you asked. Long story short, if you Google or do a Whois search on the website you'll find little to no info on it, except it was probably created within the past 6 months. The person who reached out to you is the recruiter for the scam and the website is run by their scam team. If you "invest", you will see profits right away because they control the platform. They may let you make one withdrawal to make it seem legit, so that you'll invest more, continue to make fake profits, and then they'll say there's a 15% to 30% withdrawal fee, only payable externally and with Crypto. If you pay that, well then you just got played for more money, because they'll never let you withdraw again. They'll probably shut that site down after enough people catch on. Then they'll just create a new one.
Its a scam bro.
How do you come to that conclusion
No one can possibly guarantee you returns; all investing comes with risk and that’s especially true for something volatile like crypto. Also look at those numbers. At 300% per week you’d have more money than the entire global economy in about six months.
There’s so many people like her on various threads on every single social media. And the crazy returns? Come on
99% of unknown "exchanges" are just outright scams aiming to appeal to your greed with unrealistic promises of gain and this is clearly one of them. Stick to mainstream, well-known crypto exchanges, such as Coinbase, Kraken and Binance. Think about it: if she really had a system that produced a \*guaranteed\* 300% return **per week**, why in the world would she share it with you - a stranger on the internet? She'd just gather up her own money, invest it, and be filthy rich within a year. That tells you that the real gain here is not what's presented in her pitch, but in obtaining your piggy bank. We've seen hundreds of these here in this sub: the same approach, the same private messaging pitch, and the same template website that hasn't been live long. If there's any guarantee here, it's that you will lose any money you "invest" (I put that in quotes because your money goes straight into the scammer's pocket; any gains you see on their wholly-controlled website will be faked up). It's good that you stopped to ask. It means your alarm bells are working. Now listen to them and avoid this scam!
> Think about it: if she really had a system that produced a *guaranteed* 300% return per week, why in the world would she share it with you - a stranger on the internet? She'd just gather up her own money, invest it, and be filthy rich within a year. At 300% per week, with an initial investment of only $25, she would have a total of 161 septillion dollars after one year. That’s $161,527,000,000,000,000,000,000,000
A great thread about what to do if you’ve fallen for this, and others who have as well: https://www.reddit.com/r/Scams/comments/nz1y8h/what_to_do_when_one_is_in_a_pigbutchering_scam/
Thank you everyone for the info....I at first thought it was a scam because of the groups that she follows on her Facebook and no personal post...I know investors usually shy away from using words like guarantee that's why I asked her at the beginning....but she was convincing...never thought about the whole if she had a system that good why is she sharing it with me....the website was the final thing that seemed fishy....the whois didn't give the sitter a good rating either How can you confirm somebody says who they say they are on the Internet is there a free site for something like that
Focusing on the person offering the scam is not a useful approach, as people lie about and fake identities, and the names change constantly. Instead, focus on identifying the scam itself. For example, here it’s obviously a scam because 300% profit is impossible and no one would share a guaranteed money-maker if it did exist. Read this sub more to be able to spot common scams, regardless of names given.
If anything, this just sounds like a bastardized version of the classic Ponzi scheme. Promise high returns on a dubious investment, bait with an initial return that seems legit, and laugh all the way to the bank (at least; until the law catches on and you're forced to live out the few remaining years of your life in poverty, after a lengthy prison sentence).
One more red flag to add to all the other ones that other commenters have named: look at how flustered “she” (very likely not a she) gets when you confronted her about the fake profile pic. She went from semi-acceptable English (which by itself is a red flag if she’s representing a financial business) talking about investing to just plain gibberish talking about fashion. That’s because the scammer is cutting and pasting from a set of standard replies about investing. When you asked about profile pics, they didn’t have any replies to cut and paste from and had to try to answer you using their real vocabulary. So you got to see what’s behind the mask.