Bitcoin Forum

dear forum members,

I am making this thread in attempts to raise public awareness and prevent losses for members of the community who mine dogecoin at http://doge.scryptpools.com/

I previously had mined at this pool for several weeks until I started to notice a few...discrepancies. First, the pool was experiencing downtime, orphans, and disconnects and an unusable rate. these are problems that are expected to be experienced by a pool when it is growing. The pool operator (also a member of this forum) by the name of phonetic would respond to the support thread with usually helpful sounding, although vague, responses saying he was fixing one thing or another.

come christmas, many miners were becoming weary of the problems. On top of that, phonetic raised the pool fees to 2% and released a statement saying that he did so because he felt he deserved it for "putting in time on christmas eve" to fix a problem that subsequently never became fixed. on top of that, confirmed payouts started to go missing, sometimes having their block ID removed from the database altogether. phonetic has said he would handle these problems if only the people who suffered email him personally, away from the thread. this moment was a serious red flag for me, so I started to move my doge out of the site just to be safe.

as I continued to monitor the situation over in the support thread (which, for anyone interested can reference at https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=362153.920), it had appeared that the strike phase of this plan had gone into full effect on 12/25 or 12/26. only a handful of users were reporting successful payouts at the time, and now as of 12/29 there have been over 40+ individual complaints filed in the support thread that both auto and manual payouts have stopped, and some users are reporting no payment after 4 days of waiting and still going. The pool operator has all but disappeared from the support thread, yet he is still making sure to keep his mining rig running and pool at least running to the point that he can utilize all of his 2,000 miners hashing power still, as he's finding blocks and getting paid for them.

the combined total of this pool should be around 100 million doge at it's current rate and number of miners, and coincidentally several hours ago there was a HUGE unloading of dogecoin in a SINGLE order on cryptsy for 98498370.52374497 or 98 BTC.

now, this all very well may be speculation. however, given that the Dogewallet and Dogehouse sites got hacked, these investigative findings should not be taken lightly and I call on other users to help shed light on the situation and either confirm or deny the situation as phonetic himself refused to address the issue and is now in hiding. if it is indeed a scam, it appears that may already be too late for the victims but it is not too late to stop others from making the same mistake.

hope this helps!

*kick* This deserves more attention. Some great detective work if I might say (no sarcasm).

The guy says they have mined over 2 billion Dogecoins already (last time I checked). If pool fee is at 2% then he would have gotten at least 40 million Dogecoins easily.

Thanks for the info!

I was mining them, but since Doge went down huge, I stopped!

Last Active:    December 27, 2013, 08:07:47 PM

feels kinda sad that its a scam . i can almost confirm. trying to get my doges out of the pool since i dont know how many days...

Same....

the pool has had it's ups and downs since the very beginning, but always seems to recover even if it takes a couple of days.
last payout i got was the 27th dec., havent received latest auto payout.
still hoping that it's technical issues as he posted yesterday, 28th dec., on the pool frontpage.

got 65k doge stuck :-/

ive 280k doges mate stuck on this pool ??? ???and still some guys mining on the pool...its weired

yeah, i moved pools as i would like to receive the doges i mine :-D

Please Phonetic, I have faith that you will recover my dogecoin.

Sakusenob

https://i.imgur.com/5Jx3JrF.png

it is also noted that when I asked him to give us some logistical proof that the changes he was supposedly putting into effect, as I and several other members of the pool have technical know how when it comes to systems administrations and the likes, he simply blew the question off and would not even give a timeframe for which the fixes would actually be implemented other than "soon".

it really bums me out that I tried to warn people and they blew me off early and now they're suffering for it. in the crypto world, it's either band of brothers or doge eat doge. I started as a small fry, so I know the patience it takes to have this hobby even begin to be worth it, and how devastating it can be to some. i will try to provide more information as it becomes available, and try to spread the word! there are also two separate threads in /r/dogecoin specifically relating to this scam, so I would also suggest upvoting either as well to raise public awareness. here are the links:

http://www.reddit.com/r/dogecoin/comments/1tw7q8/miners_beware_dogescryptpoolscom_potential_scam/
and
http://www.reddit.com/r/dogecoin/comments/1tw9cs/psa_scryptpoolscom_is_not_paying_out/

EDIT: another sleuth in the support thread did a whois search on the guy and lo and behold, I present to you red flag #2:

With the domain hidden in Panama, should we be suprised??

Admin Name: WHOISGUARD PROTECTED
Admin Organization: WHOISGUARD, INC.
Admin Street: P.O. BOX 0823-03411
Admin City: PANAMA
Admin State/Province: PANAMA
Admin Postal Code: NA
Admin Country: PA
Admin Phone: +507.8365503
Admin Phone Ext:
Admin Fax: +51.17057182
Admin Fax Ext:
Admin Email: DA836B0552E84095BF668F41D90BAF95.PROTECT@WHOISGUARD.COM

"He has made the mistake of hosting in US  (In Kansas) via Digital Ocean though, so if anyone wants to track him down via Fed's it should be possible." as stated by the investigator. this is almost a 100% confirmed scam now, can we get this stickied by an admin?

Not gonna lie cthulu, he was pretty good about being informative and letting us know what was going on, about until you spearheaded a smear campaign against the guy. I received payouts regularly, and sure there was some unrest with the few issues that were forming, but you went on a full blown attack and regularly berated the guy on his thread. I mean, I got about Đ20k tied up on his server and that sucks and I know plenty have in the Đ100k's, but Jesus I wouldn't be surprised if he certainly doesn't try to right the wrongs with how you treated him. Sure, it sucks that he isn't responsive, but I don't mind pinning some blame on you for the fact he isn't responding at all.

Also, the WHOIS Protection means nothing. Think about how often his site got DDOS'd before XMAS -- Why wouldn't you want to get WHOIS protection? And for all we know, the Panama protection was the most inexpensive. Means nothing.

EDIT :: Directly from the WhoisGuard website: "WhoisGuard protection can be obtained as an addon to domains registered at our partner registrars."

You MIGHT be right, but I don't want to slam him so hard he decides not to fix it.  I'm still holding out on him coming around and returning the coins.

Josh

if you suppose saying "im going to fix things" and "soon" are acceptable answers then yeah sure I guess you can consider that "informative". what you're referring to as a smear campaign is actually a public awareness campaign. he's had over 4 days to even give a single response to anyone, including the several times I asked for answers about the discrepancies. if anything, I welcome him to join this discussion and tell us all where the remainder of everyone's doge is. he had admitted that he was put into debt because the pool grew faster than he had expected. I'm not one to go and try to hurt someone's reputation until I have some pretty solid proof but I'm not the only one with the problem. however, I am the only one with a voice aside from those coming forward with their stories of how my investigation is potentially valid. there's already collectively confirmed over 500k doge in limbo, that is enough to merit some sort of response. and I'm aware about the WHOIS scenario, but in light of the recent hacks of dogewallet and dogehouse, it's better to air on the side of caution. also, he shouldn't have to spoof his address if he has nothing to hide.

if in fact he has stopped responding because I have confronted him directly about this, then all the more reason to be suspicious. if that were even the case though, he would most likely just freeze my account....why take it out on the whole pool? and if you trust your money to someone of that maturity level then I can see even greater losses coming in your future. as I said, this is all speculation until he comes forth and gives at least a reasonable explanation as to why he's still running the pool and not paying anyone out.

Congratulations on your 15 minutes of fame, gained purely through smearing another persons reputation and your investigation. Also, please welcome yourself to not inferring anything regarding myself -- I have seen how vile your inferrances can be. Personally, I am mining elsewhere until the situation resolves itself -- just saying that your vitriol is doing NOTHING to help people get their Đ. You could have EASILY just pointed out that people aren't getting funds, instead of you attacking someone who realistically has ZERO responsibility towards paying people other than his own moral compass (Technically we put faith into someone in the hopes he will fulfill his end of the agreement).

Which is even more of a reason to disapprove of your "methods." You "called bullshit" after 14 hours of non-payment, attacked other people who didn't agree with your crusade, and mocked the host you affectionately call "Phony-tic." Then statements like "How about instead of getting butthurt, put your money where your mouth is brochacho and start addressing the issues" do little to add to your calling my maturity level into question.

Just saying, while what you are doing in essence IS GOOD, because you are trying to help others not get screwed (IF THIS TURNS OUT TO BE A SCAM) -- No need to shit on the one guy who (if he isn't scamming people) will help people get their payments. You've done your part, and just leave it as is. I know I will, because I'm still making money -- just not on scryptpools (for now).

I've been waiting four days. Request manual payment and fails. I again request and says "You already have one active manual payout request."... Phonetic tell us something. I have sent several mail and has not replied to any.

FWIW I was paid 150k doge from Scryptpool on Christmas Eve.

And thats why I always tell people to stay at smaller pools like mine and NOT give so much hashing power in one hand/one pool... especially when there is no fee ...

You can't drive a pool without any fee for long, its costs a shitload of time and money when it grows..

Many don't understand the difficulty rise and only see their earnings getting smaller, then they think they can earn more at a larger pool (as they find more blocks in shorter time) and join them .. and the problem starts again..

Its too late when they notice that their earnings are even smaller there as the blocks are shared between too many...

I just submitted a manual payout request, I guess we shall see.

try doge-pool.com instead. They are giving away big bonusses to boost their pool.

My thoughts exactly.  cthulu and his ilk act like the only possibility is that Phonetic absconded with our Doge.  I think it is entirely likely that the guy invested a lot of time and his own money into this pool.  When he re-opened registrations, the load again swamped the servers.  He spent a lot of time on Christmas eve and Christmas day trying to fix it, only to have people like cthulu scream "SCAMMER!"  Phonetic may have said "Screw this!  I spent my money and missed time with my family on Christmas to get called a scammer?  I'm going to take a few days to clear my head."  He may also be working on the problem and waiting to make an announcement when he has it finished.  No matter what is going on, it is way too early to assume that he absconded with our Doge.

why don't you ask him yourself? he's been here the whole time.


from the support thread.

Well, everything was ok untill the pool went down big time. Noone wants to lose hours of mining. I personally didnt have a failover option yet. Cost me lot of coins but shit happens. He deserves some time to get everything fixed and then we will judge him. He  said something about 3 servers. Maybe something good is at stakes..lets wait!

If you have submitted a manual withdrawal, please resubmit it."
Does not work.

5 days ago, requesting manual payment. I have not received. Where are you? Phonetic?

Xmas vacation? Maybe?

If your pool wallet is 0, it will queue up payments indefinitely.

Chances are, he emptied the wallet.

I have got 500 000 there!!
please help !!

If you have submitted a manual withdrawal, please resubmit it."
Does not work.

6 days ago, requesting manual payment. I have not received. Where are you? Phonetic?

Is everyone free to set up a pool and just keep all the earnings to himself? Sound good.
Can anyone help me create a pool, then? There is no kind of control? Are we mining at our own risk??? WTF???
With 2% fee and 3 Gh/s pool rate i wouldnt do it. Sounds short-term stupidity.

sad fact new pools have the most risk

8 days ago, requesting manual payment. I have not received. Where are you? Phonetic?

Chill!! The guy just got a huge hangover  :P

they're tryin to be fast-pool?  :-[
doge can be promising. such pools like this and fastpool just really sucks.

> "lost so many coins"

why would anybody keep so many dogecoins in a pool?

Just to let you know netcodepool (http://www.netcodepool.org) has been in business from last 1.5 years  

It is recommended to always check the history of a pool, before pointing your big hashers towards them.

I got all my payouts from there before I got out, but I did notice it was pretty inconsistent.

Now I'm at multipool instead, I'm not even mining DOGE the whole time, but i'm getting easily 3x as much doge as at scryptpools.

I just point the payout addresses of all the coins I don't care about to cryptsy (https://www.cryptsy.com/users/register?refid=102649) on auto-sell and keep the coins I do like. Much better DOGE than @ scryptpools, plus I'm selling other coins for BTC too in the rare moments one of them is more profitable than DOGE.

Im very happy with fast-pool.com
Auto payments ON TIME always!!
Manual payments before i check my wallet are there. All good but the coin itself :)

I had submitted one on the 29th.  Still no payout.  I waited about 3 days and used the contact form. Haven't heard back yet.   Just for fun I also set my automatic transaction to  10000 and mined another 10k coins to see if it would pay out ( it didn't)     I suppose all we can do is wait.

Add me to the list of those who have DOGE tied up in scryptpools pending payment for like 8+ days now. Surprised they still have people mining there..

why would anyone still be mining at a pool that doesn't payout, it's not like there are a shortage of pools.  No one should have to be waiting 8+ for a payout, that's beyond being patient.

So I take it we can kiss whatever remaining doge we have on this pool goodbye?

Lame.

This is the exact reason I got frustrated and started my own pool. Hope to see people join my pool. Its solid, stable, FAST, low response times, with DDOS protection, ready to scale, and is ready for 6GHS to start. For more info check out my other thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=421637.0

Thank you.

someone is doing something to get doge back?

No, attempts are being made to identify the scammer that's all. The doge's are long gone and you will not be getting them back unfortunately.