Bitcoin Forum

Here is the link to their official website https://metamask.io (https://metamask.io)

Due to the increasing number of new crypto investors there are increasing numbers of scam Ads pointing you to a fake replica site where they can steal your assets. Read through this article as a warning on scam Ads: https://www.thesun.co.uk/money/16764487/metamask-users-loses-thousands-on-google-ad-scam/ (https://www.thesun.co.uk/money/16764487/metamask-users-loses-thousands-on-google-ad-scam/)

Also, this was published today so it's still an ongoing problem: https://coingape.com/fake-metamask-wallet-fraud-rises-in-china-amid-defi-and-dex-popularity/ (https://coingape.com/fake-metamask-wallet-fraud-rises-in-china-amid-defi-and-dex-popularity/)

Unfortunately, this is a recurring practice, and people need to realize that an ad is no guarantee of there being a legit advertiser behind, although the "Ad" thingy probably leads people to trust it more than they should. Probably better to block ads altogether, but likely over 90% of the population don’t.

Hypothesis: I’m pretty sure that something could be done by simply providing ads with a hint to the age of the advertiser on the platform (icon, colour, whatever). These scams, I figure, tend to come from novel accounts, and probably get banned after being reported enough. They therefore likely do not live a long life in the Google ecosystem, and play more on the rinse and repeat from afresh type behaviour. Longer lasting advertising accounts are (and this is my hypothesis) less likely to lead to fake sites. Perhaps a simple yellow indicator pointing to a novel account advertiser would be useful to warn people to properly check the advertiser. Of course, if most of the advertisers in general are relatively novel to the Google Ads platform, this idea would be void.

Ideally though, Google would get their act together, and find more thorough procedures to verify their Ads. How? I don't really know. That's their responsability.

I have had different random outcomes while looking through any keywords, searching metamatk then appear couple of results that would normal behavior from searching engine. Do I just touch them and should I send all my assets to a hacker, clearly not! But, this things vary person to person. It's always recommend taking precaution before dumping our assets to any random hackers, so I appreciate this post.

Seems like every time cryptocurrencies gain mainstream attention and adoption that kind of scam keep popping out, not to mention many multi-variate scams are ready to make use of every newcomer.

I just recently came across from another thread (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5376498.msg58690156#msg58690156), whereas it is likely the OP is using a fake Metamask wallet. I have to reiterate that simply using ad blockers is simply a no brainer. But it is just one thing over other security practices. And by seeing the article you refer to where the victim has a CS degree really make that the barrier for non-tech-savvy users to simply adopt cryptocurrencies is one thing that needs to be considered and addressed.

Yeah, there are too many people mostly the newbies are becoming victim of these fake apps and links. They think that it's the official app like metamask because it really looks like it.
I've seen around people who are surprised that their assets were gone and doesn't admit that they've downloaded the fake one which led them for being phished.

I have even seen some experienced or old crypto enthusiast who do fall out with these simple scams through those google ads which i could say that it is

really a careless act.It is understandabble for some noobs but not for experienced ones because thats truly a human error.

Once you do experience it then you would really make yourself aware in all of your time here on crypto. You'll learn with those mistakes.

thanks for pointing that out, I almost was a victim of scam ads like these, I once tried to enter mexc (mxc before) and I almost fell for it but I realized it wasn't the official one, and from that point I avoided clicking on any ads that show up when I Google any website, and the thing that can make people fall for it is being on top of the Google results, so avoiding those ads is for the best.

The scammers and hackers were so crazy these days. They keep robbing more and more money from spreading the fake application and phishing.
Google was only care about money lol, so many scam ads getting published everyday. That was also making a lot of people feel confuse. People need to put more effort to be able identify the scam app but sometimes i have seen so many newbies can't get which was the real app. So many people already reported this.

I do believe china regulators will be taking action against it.

Thanks for sharing though i had Bookmarked Metamask in all my gadgets for safer use everytime i need to access or download.

and this is what i am doing for long time now as i know there are many phishing and scam site that will popped as popularity increases.

THIS ... and it must happen ..Google needs to act more than what they are doing now.

Scammers and hackers know how to still earn money using platforms that are widely used and make it look like they are legitimate even though they are scammers by using phishing sites through advertisements, I read the article the amount that was lost was quite large and it happened only by accident that he clicked on the wallet ads it is deeply regretted. Use bookmarks is safe ways in my opinions.

There have been many bigger asset burglaries and it has indeed entered the media because of the large number of hacks, especially Uniswap and Pancakeswap users and this often happens to Metamask errors whose negligence is ourselves who never noticed that it was a phishing site and when the wrong click will result in big losses then this needs to be careful and look at the correct URL.
Many cases have occurred and there have been many reports of phishing sites that we have caught and revealed in this forum.

There're so many phishing sites not only on Metamask, so it's very adviceable to download on official websites and check the domain with Who Is.

It would be better if the software can be verifiable the signature, just like Electrum.

In addition the official websites can be hacked too, it will be a different problem if the hacker replace the legit with faked one.  You need to follow the news and research.

According to this article: How to Ensure You’re Running the Legitimate Version of MetaMask (https://medium.com/mycrypto/how-to-ensure-youre-running-the-legitimate-version-of-metamask-5fcd8ab32b96). You can verify the legitimacy of the Metamask file integrity, in chrome-based OSbrowser you can rely on the extension ID and for Firefox, you have to manually check the sha256 hash. Unfortunately, the link that refers to which the good hash of the extension on Firefox hasn't been updated until the latest version. And neither I can confirm whether to rely on an extension id is secure enough. So, i guess bookmarked the official link is a must for Metamask.

Scammers always trying to get ahead of investors and develop new ways of scamming innocent investors, since metamask is one of the popular decentralized wallet used by many people it now becomes the target of scammers to use in scamming investors of their funds, investors should check properly to ensure the are using the legit extension, so unfortunately the length scammers are will to go to scam people.

Until now, it is undeniable that scammers have made breakthroughs to deceive users who are not careful and this is real not only in wallets but all those connected to Google services, because anyone can create advertisements based on following the requirements that have been attached to Google. a Scam ads can also be seen when we are browsing or opening an application

this is what i do, because in the past i have been a victim of phishing site and also by cloning my account.

since that moment i make sure to just download a legit site by checking complete details, looking at how many downloads of that site and how many reviews are given.

from those i can be sure that i only get the finest and true site i need.

A big example was on Axie players. In our local community on social media, lots of "new players" in the crypto environment got phished because of those random links they found on the internet while browsing for the download link for Metamask, Marketplace, and Ronin wallet. Even after downloading those successfully from a legit source, they are instead got victims of those random ads.

Can't blame them but they should not be carried away from the excitement of playing that game. As a result, instead of enjoying, they are in devastating loss as the price of an Axie team is not a joke.

A friend was not lucky and got scammed through a phishing metamask site and lost his funds as a result, it is very important we go directly to the official website to download, a lot of fake links out there trying to scam you, people should be extremely careful.

It is not about scamming mate instead Hacking is what the target of those who provide fake site, I have a friend that once become a victim of something like this.
when he clicked or entered a wrong site and then eventually realized that His account has been hacked .
so downloading fake site will only lead you to become hacked and then will make your funds taken and surely you'll be good as dead after the hacking.
also make sure to check complete details of the of each apps/site before the download because they are almost similar from the original.