Bitcoin Forum

I am not sure if this subject has discussed previously, if so I wanna repeat once again, I can't see anything wrong to remind few good things.

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Some of us using this forum to sell goods or something else including currency exchange. First I want to suggest use forum escrow before deal with any untrusted person. Sometimes peoples are avoiding use escrow in order to save escrow fees and sometimes they are getting scam. The problem is even they made the deal outside forum and they use some third party chat apps like telegram. So it would become quite complicated to prove that you was scammed. Because simply any chat history would be edited. When you will read this Accusation (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5250337.0) then you will see accused and accuser both are blaming each other. And it's become quite complicated who is right and who is wrong.

So we could avoid such as situation if you make deal via forum PM. You don't need to chat everything, you may chat on other apps and finally before send money ask seller to send full details about product, price and btc address  via your forum PM then you may send fund and reply him. So what will happen if seller scam you? You can make accusation with proper evidence, if seller deny your claim then it could be verify via forum moderators by report to admin from PM option. So if seller want to continue business here then he will have to pay back either send product. Otherwise he would marked red and you may open flag type 3.

Conclusion: Always use forum escrow before make any kind of deal on the forum. So your funds will be safe, just don't be stingy for escrow fees. And must make final deal via forum PM. Whatever you have discussed out of forum, just write final deal on forum PM, so it would help expose scammer if commit a scam.

Reminding is something that needs to be done continuously, and I don't see anything wrong with that. The important thing to tackle IMO is how would people be aware in the first place. To be honest, I have been scammed in this forum when I was still new. I trusted quickly and thought that there is a lot of trustworthy people back then. I didn't have any idea to do a transaction during the first time, I just posted and thought that it could be a smooth transaction.

I hope people should be aware as well when doing transactions, don't be like me, lol.

In another case, using forum PM has other advantages for buyer/customers.

1. Reply with quote will automatically save your conversation with the seller on your outbox lists. So, if in an accident, you are deleting inbox, you have a backup from outbox.
2. PMs also emailed to you in a clear text. If you are missing conversation because the PMs deleted from your inbox/outbox, you can send another proof from Bitcointalk email. It will help you get more support from members than you have given a proof from other services (social media PM or chat).

Moreover, it's easy to impersonate as someone else if you are dealing off forum. Hence, you must only do deal through on forum message.
If anyone wants to learn more about forum PM system and how it works & can be used effectively- https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5161490.0

You had me worried lol.

Click bait title :P

Result if auto correction , Lol.
Corrected now  ;)

That's the real concern, newbies aren't much familiar with forum system. But we should point them how it work then they would save themselves from scammers. Evertime scammers are changing their scam method, that's why always should use escrow and chat via forum PM. So at least scammer will get punished and other users would be aware bu this way.

Why not doing that publicly? It's the best way to be safe. You have indisputable proofs in case of scam.

But I have a question, what are the common rates of escrows?

There are some people that even he/she got reminded of something but still forgot what it is. I agree with crwth that there reminding someone or everybody is not a bad thing to start with. It's more likely a notification email that reminding you that you can use a service in the forum like escrow for transaction when buying or selling things and it is also helpful to sent pm to gambling sites owner when they experience issues or problems with the platform (for gamblers).

Mostly newbies are getting scammed while dealing on bitcointalk and they do have PM restrictions which were taken as an advantage by the scammer but the idea of final discussion via PM can be a solution for this.Better use escrow for all the trades even while dealing with the member who got positive trust because with the new trust score it is easily abused by some members to get positive ratings for their account.

The forum PM is the perfect step to record transactions or that we have made a transaction. This can be used as valid proof for all fraud cases. I am agree with this.

To be honest, I have already practiced this step on a number of transactions that I do, even though I dont use Escrow, but I dont mind doing it and everything works smoothly. But this is also completely insecure because there is no escrow handling transactions, even though I have valid proof at the time in PM. Keep using Escrow is to make transactions safer because there is no guarantee we wont be cheated when the opportunity arises.

Some private information gets shared during a trade, and the parties involved may not want this to be public knowledge, it could also lead to threads getting derailed if all the negotiations are done publicly.

This is a good thread on the list of escrow services: Recommend bitcointalk escrow services (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2439910.msg24991775#msg24991775). The thread has not been updated for a while so do your research on their individual ANN threads.
Note that despite the title name, the forum does not recommend any escrow service nor does it regulate them. DYOR.

True, PM can't be verified by other forum members and screenshots can be manipulated. The admins can read private conversations, but IIRC theymos does not like that practice, so it would be quite a hassle to prove the scam.
Combining both private and public conversations looks like the best alternative, possibly the first contact and the final decision should be made public, the hassles of negotiations should be done in private imo.

I agree with other parts of your post but AFAIK Admins or even Moderators aren't verifying the validity for such things since the "Report To Admin" button was designed for something else...

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In addition to what you mentioned, they need to have the correct settings on "Personal Message Options":

https://i.imgur.com/9SYJuWl.jpg