Bitcoin Forum

https://twitter.com/Raindropactual/status/1205162036252094470

I challenge the Bitcointalk community to make 2020's Proof of Keys the most impactful one yet. But it will take you reposting the writeup and raising awareness. Protect your fellow cryptocurrency friends from HitBTC's fraud.

This is the longest-running and possibly largest scale fraud that has ever taken place in our industry. This deserves your time, at least to skim through the post and share. Price talk can wait. If you're "in it for the tech" speak with actions, not words.

And yet banks have been doing this for more than a century just fine, and no one cares. As time passes i think the temptation will only increase, and the shadier exchanges/online wallets will do fractional reserve in secret, just like bankers did before it was made legal by their own lobbying in the 19th century.

Last year no site failed because of the event. If anything they can be prepared for it, its kinda useless to tell them in advance. Its like they can simply borrow some money for a few days, not unlike a bank avoids bankruptcy when their central bank loans them the money needed to wait for things to "calm down".

Bitcoin day should be named as such, and sure you can celebrate it among other things by withdrawing all your money from any online wallets in advance, among other rituals you may have. But don't delude yourself thinking that because the site still operates after Jan 3 means its safe. Not in your wallet, means not in your control. You don't (and should not) wait for Jan 3 to find out.

Make sure you participate in the service discussion area for any specific claims against specific sites...

I understand that many people are really doubting the viability of the HitBTC exchange and this suspicion has been going around for years now. Though of course, the exchange is still doing good business some are already picturing a bleak future for this platform. Actually, this exchange is not on my priority list as a service provider because of a bad experience before and I do not usually make a lot of trades in there and just do it if there is no other choice (when a certain asset can only be traded in HitBTC). Will this exchange implode in 2020? Let's find out by just waiting.

When you say 'banks have been doing this' what do you mean? Fractional reserve is one thing. Selective scamming ran by an anonymous team pretending to be conducting AML? Very weak analogy. I see the direction you're trying to go here, but it's apples and oranges -- and I'm critical of banks, too.

This year. we can make HitBTC fail. I concur such efforts should not be isolated to Proof of Keys, but how fitting would it be to have that be the time HitBTC is too insolvent to even pretend to function?

The point is, every time you make a trade on HitBTC: you take a risk for yourself and finance a fraudulent operation. The article discusses this.

It's not just "suspicion" about HitBTC. The facts are all there. It's not just "bad experiences." It's data. And it's about things bigger than that trade you want to make: the health of our industry.

The whole Proof of keys thing is just an exercise against fractional reserve. I have no idea what other type of scam you refer to, as i have not been checking the services discussion (or scamming) about that particular exchange. The event itself is general directed at no specific site but to all of them.

From your intention, simply convincing their customers, and their customers alone would do. A sort of boycott. If their customer base doesn't get in panic, even if some of them withdraw slowly, they will have time to shrink (same as banks). Unfortunately i doubt all their customers read Bitcointalk, let alone your message. I bet many don't even speak English. Only a scandal and people unable to withdraw would get their attention, and by then it is too late. That's how all of the earlier failed exchanges went. Not unlike a bankrun...

I think you should read the blog post: https:/[Suspicious link removed]/ZxJSZ3RuH0?amp=1 -- no offense intended (in fact, it seems you and I see eye-to-eye on some things like banks) but I think you're missing some context.

Proof of Keys is not just an exercise against fractional reserve. In fact, fractional reserve really isn't the most appropriate terminology -- it'd be "solvency." Exchanges, by premise of being a custodial service, are evaluated on solvency. If exchanges were permitted/expected to run on fractional reserve, man, we'd be in a way worse spot with the industry right now, lol. The point is that exchanges shouldn't be on fractional reserve at all (under the model of most centralized exchanges) and if they can't prove that (via solvency) than... it should speak for itself.

You are correct in that it will require a ton of elbow grease. Warning their current customers and preventing future customers is, indeed, a hell of an undertaking; hence the call to arms on this. I agree with you -- Bitcointalk constitutes a slice demographic of HitBTC users, hence why this has been shared on varied platforms --  let alone, as you mentioned, the language barrier, which is why the blog post encourages translation and sharing. Ultimately, the goal is to get this information in front of as many people as possible -- less victims of HitBTC's scheme is a good thing for the industry.

The best case? So many people (existing HitBTC users) withdraw, and so few people (would-be HitBTC users) deposit, that HitBTC is forced into the 'scandal' you describe. This ultimate goal is described in the blog post. So, in reality, we're on the same sheet of music, friend  ;D

Already we have faced a lot of problematic situation regarding this issue, so we have to make a plan in a proper way for staying safe in this cryptocurrency world, day by day everything in here is getting complicated and risky so this should be removed for the shake of this system for earning more acceptability towards people, I think this cryptocurrency system is not a for a year or a month, I believe cryptocurrency will be the main key of the monetary system in the coming days, so this system should be safe and sound, otherwise, it will be losing its credibility day after day.

as i said the first time they started this "proof of keys" thing, it is the most nonsense social drama ever. the basis of it is good though, when it says "if you don't own the keys, you don't own bitcoin" but the fact that it keeps encouraging people to withdraw from exchanges on a certain date for instance, is pure nonsense and if people were to comply it will actually hurt the market as it would increase the volatility by a lot since it thins the order books and lets the whales manipulate the market so much easier!
for example if people made a withdrawal because of proof of keys nonsense today, we may see price either shoot up to $15k or drop to $5k since it would be easy and cheap to push it in that direction. of course it will come right back to its previous level as all the coins that were withdrawn would be deposited back if not more!

you see, if you are trading then you have no other choice but leave your coins in open orders that you want to be filled on exchanges. and you can't single out one exchange and say this one is scam. they are all horrible. from the biggest and most trusted ones like Coinbase and Binance down to the worst one like Yobit are all the same when it comes to scamming their users. they can do the same exact thing and guess what they have been doing it!

Another one stupid event. Are you undestand what one big dead exchagne may cause? Another one fud wave and another one drop

If you're suggesting that it's less damaging to the industry to permit HitBTC to continue to selectively scam (or exchanges to continue to operate insolvenet) because of "FUD" -- you're thinking (generously) short-term, and more accurately, you're missing gaps of context.

If anything, the industry self-policing would instill more confidence.

Stop thinking of price in a one week timeframe. Start thinking 3-5 years.

Picking up traction and getting reposted elsewhere: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/e9z11e/hitbtc_do_not_respond_to_tickets_frozen_a_huge/

I don't know about that. Honestly, I haven't used an exchange like that for a while, but when I needed to convert one type of crypto into another type, I used HitBTC. It was like 2 years ago, and I thought it was a reliable exchange. A friend of mine had some tokens and wanted to sell them for BTC. HitBTC was the biggest exchange with these tokens available, and even though it was a pretty big transaction worth around $1k, it was cheap (even though the article's about high withdrawal fees), fast, smooth and with no KYC or anything. But scamming people to pay other people is terrible.

HitBTC is one of the worthless exchange in this industry full of fake trades and volume. It's so shameful how people are taking advantage of the blockchain industry to commit all these scams. Project managers should make the necessary research about exchanges before listing their coins over there because so many coins have lost their value when listed on HitBTC because of its low fake trading volume.

This.

At this point, it's not just on HitBTC -- but as the publication discusses, the entire industry.

If a blockchain project (ICO or otherwise) lists on HitBTC, now that this is public knowledge, they're essentially saying "we don't care about the risks to users of our coin/token, nor the problems HitBTC poses to the industry."

There are numerous other listing options, some of which are cheaper. It's fairly likely, at this point, if a project can only get listed on HitBTC, it's because they failed/would fail due diligence of reputable exchanges. A red flag in and of itself.

Can't remember the last time I use HitBTC, I can't say they are scam because I got all the funds I have. No more no less. Since the time exchanges asks KYC I started using two exchange only and hitbtc isn't one of them. But I might just need them one day.

I'm curious how they scammed OP though because if its his $150K that's been frozen, I wanna hear what HitBTC had to say.

Last time this was done, no exchange went down. So it was either not successful in it's goal or the exchanges outsmarted the customers.  ::)  You

cannot do this without the support of a LOT of people or the whole experiment would be useless. It also expose a lot of people to a lot of harm,

because these exchanges has to pull more coins out of cold storage and it makes these exchanges more juicy targets for hackers. So, be careful

with all the withdrawals, it might do more harm than good.  ::)

it's a nice idea, but i don't think proof of keys has ever had much of an impact. in fact, i recall a scandal around this year's event where hitbtc froze accounts the day before: https://bitcoinist.com/hitbtc-trace-mayer-john-mcafee-keys/

but after a couple days, everyone forgot about it and things went back to normal.

i've been warning people away from hitbtc for a while, but experience has taught me that most people won't learn until an exchange fails or exit scams with their money. until that happens, people just don't understand the gravity of the risks they are taking by storing funds on exchanges.

Nothing happens until something happen just like the case of cryptopia. P2Pb2b is something where the group of users finally found something to nail the owners because they were caught having fake member profiles in their website. This is a sure way to see they can potentially scam people. HitBTC I guess can defend itself because if they were up to exit, they would have done it while BTC was $20k. But its true we see scam accusation to hitBTC, not sure if it were proven.

For the record though, here is a nice discussion on previous proof of keys event.

Tomorrow is "Proof of Keys Day". (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5092198.0)
Proof of Keys / Proof of Trust / Bitcoin Independence Day (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5089115.0)

And yes, after this event, nothing will happen eventually, people will continue to go on with their 'normal lives' here in crypto. As for HitBTC, it has a lot of accusations in the past, so I don't know why people continue to trade on it.

Coinbase actually started to move its cold wallet holdings around the time proof of keys was announced. It happened well before the actual event, probably to let people know they are in control of all people's funds so that they don't have to withdraw any funds themselves.

https://blog.coinbase.com/notice-of-blockchain-movements-b09cb1ec46dd

I find it hard to believe that it was coincidence. It could be, but the timing was very suspicious. I however don't think we'll see them do something similar this year. They must have noticed that there isn't much community support for such an event. You'll only see so called Bitcoin maximalists bark on social media, but I'm quite sure they aren't withdrawing funds themselves.

Fair observations about the apathy demonstrated by many cryptocurrency users in past years. Why not change it this year, though? HitBTC is likely at a level of insolvency where an adequate amount of action could be the final nail in their coffin.

More and more people on Twitter have had fraud prevented by many people (possibly including some of you) sharing this piece.

Let's keep up the momentum. This is our moment to demonstrate our industry is no longer in infancy. Take the 30 seconds and do something for our industry that will echo in eternity.

nobody in the community cares about this event because it is very flawed, verging on idiotic.
it is one thing to tell newbies not to "store" their coins with third parties when they don't control the keys, but it is another to tell "everyone" including traders to stop trading and pull their coins out of exchanges for no reason!
it is like telling everyone not to go out of the house because they may have a car accident!!!

Nobody is saying to stop trading completely, or to disavow from all exchanges.

Proof of Keys suggests to withdraw from exchanges, sure -- but does not say to do so permanently, nor to stop trading.

The particular undertaking I'm advocating for is a lot more specific.

The fact "nobody cares" (which isn't true -- this has gotten a fair bit of traction, but perhaps you're remarking on the ratio of interest on this topic relative to moonlamboprice talk) is a problem in the industry.

Your analogy has zero foundation.

Over/under on "partners" of HitBTC bailing over the next month?  ;D

i am talking about the market disruption that such actions would cause and the fact that it will not solve anything at all. it is not about "moonlamboprice" but it is about price. lets take a look at the event.
what is it trying to prove? insolvency of exchanges. how many would participate? 1%? 5%? 10%? 100%? i'd say it is small around 5%. even the worst exchange at the brink of extinction could pay that many users and fool everyone that everything is OK! so what would be the result of the event? it proved that an insolvent exchange is not insolvent! all the while create some unnecessary transactions on the mainnet (ie. spam) twice, once when they withdraw and another time when they re-deposit.

now lets say bigger percentage like 80% participated. the result would be to prove a single particular exchange is insolvent but also it will create chaos in the market as now the remaining 20% control the price. they can easily push it in any direction they want, you can wake up and see price has gone up to $18k or has dropped to $3k because there is no support or resistance anymore as 80% of the market has abandoned it.
and not just that, every single exchange out there would start having problems as they can't pay all their users right away since they keep most of their coins in cold storage that takes time to retrieve.

that is why i don't see anything good coming out of this... but i guess we will see once again how the results of it are going to be in a month from now like last year :D

The amount that participate depends upon the amount that care enough to spur such participation. If I had to guess, if 10% of the wider industry/cryptocurrency users were aware enough to participate, it'd be the end of HitBTC. It's totally achievable. This isn't isolated to Proof of Keys, either. If more people were warned about Bitconnect (and heeded those warnings earlier,) the fraud wouldn't have gone on as long and less people would've been burned.

It sounds like you disagree with some elements regarding Proof of Keys, which would be a whole other debate. However, if you can't get behind folks running the hell away from HitBTC, well... oof.

you are focusing too much on a single exchange while there are so many more exchanges that are a lot more scammy than HitBTC such as Yobit, bittrex, poloniex,... and there are indisputable proof of their scams. but guess what, nobody cares and they still keep going back to these exchanges and get scammed!
events like Proof of Keys are just social media drama that achieve nothing as long as people are blind to the warnings.

None of the exchanges you cited are more scammy than HitBTC.

I'm not doubting your commentary on Yobot, but Bittrex is far from "scammy." Provide anything to dispute that and I'll review it. Same for Poloniex -- and I have my disagreements with some of their recent decisions, but if "scammy" is defined as insolvent/selective scamming, no.

Apathy of others isn't an excuse for yours. Make people not blind to the warnings. I seem to have more faith in your abilities than you do.

If you think this isn't resulting in anything, you're wrong: https://twitter.com/Raindropactual/status/1206413497925390337

HitBTC's BTC wallets have continually drained over the past days, currently under 90 BTC collectively. There has also been a huge uptick in selective scam reports from people on Twitter, Reddit, and their own Telegram channel. Also, some trading pairs have mysteriously "gone down for maintenance" -- AKA, HitBTC liquidating those shitcoins to get a little more BTC to pretend to be operational.

With a strong push from the community, we could make HitBTC too insolvent to even pretend to be functional.

Strike now.

An interesting development. But it can make a positive contribution. Hitbtc has recently been wounded in this regard. Everyone has to pay more attention to security. New developments are happening but there is another issue The intentions need to be good. Blockchain is a revolution or the mainstay of new ponzi systems.

There's an easy way if the melts bother you. Choose Dex Exchanges. Your money stays in your wallet!

They've been wounded, but let's make sure it is the death blow.

74 BTC and dwindling. More trading pairs going offline.

SPREAD THIS.