Bitcoin Forum

Hi Guys

A few years ago, I was defrauded by some company and they fooled me into investing money with their fake company.

I reported that to the police and to the trading organizations at that time.
Of course, I did not get any money back and the police told me that cannot do anything.

Now, I keep getting calls from people (fraudsters I am sure) telling me that I have a few bitcoins blocked in my name. One of them even sent me a screenshot (I am sure that is fake as well).
They want me to give them 5% so that they can transfer me the bitcoins (I learned the hard way how fraud works), and I am not sending any money to get any money.

My question is...

How, where, and is it possible to check if I really have any bitcoins blocked in my name? (If yes, then how)

Thanks
Andy

*** To any Fraudsters reading this, I am not going to give you any money so please don't try to fool me again. (Fool me once - shame on you, fool me twice - shame on me).

The answer is simple: Bitcoins aren't stored "in any name". All you need to access your Bitcoins is the private key. There's no names, no paperwork and no intermediary involved.

The modern version of the Nigerian scam. As a rule of thumb: if you need to pay before you get paid, you're getting scammed.

Chances are your number is on a high-value list of targets that have been scammed before. You could consider changing phone numbers to get rid of it.

first thing to think about:
a. how did they get your number to scam you specifically?
b. to send you a screenshot, was this by cellphone using same number or did they email you?

these are important because if you only gave your number to 1 bitcoin service (which might have sold its customer data on) you can try finding the scammer via the service that gave away your details

usually bitcoin scammer only waste time calling people they know had/have some pre-existing experience/knowledge of bitcoin. (why waste years calling every number in the phonebook)

also if the other fraud scammed you.. you may have been put on whats known as a 'suckers list', which is basically a list which organised scammers have of people that fell for that scam, and they trade contact details with each other. thus your name may be in the hands of hundreds of scammers knowing your an existing victim and ripe to attempt to victimise again.
(again why waste time on the less naive)

you see this happen alot in older women. they get scammed once, then hounded by hundreds of scammers later

your best bet is to change your number and if they now have your email (if they sent screenshot via email) change that too

In my experience, people are seldom in a hurry to get hold of you when they owe you money.  

Even if it was a legitimate company or service you have used on a previous occasion and you recall depositing bitcoins with them, in all likelihood, they're still not going to contact you to say "hey, we've still got your BTC".  It's generally up to you to keep track of which platforms you need to withdraw your money from.  

And if you've never heard of the people who are calling you, it's very unlikely they've got any of your money.

a. how did they get your number to scam you specifically?

Some idiot gave my number and name on some website and the calls never stopped.

b. to send you a screenshot, was this by cellphone using same number or did they email you?
Emailed to me.

I guess I am in the suckers list. : :)  ;D


All you need to access your Bitcoins is the private key.
How do you get this key?

Consider changing your number at this point and let people know that you have since moved on to a different number. You are basically being targeted again since they know that you have been involved with crypto before and that they thought you could easily be scammed since you've already fallen into a trap before.


You get this key immediately after creating a wallet. If you haven't created the wallet yourself, you will not have this key unless[/u] the one who created it gave you the private key, or by any chance, you just cracked it through brute-forcing or other such methods which is deemed impossible at the moment.

Seems simple to me.  Tell them to send you 95% and keep 5% for themselves...  This scam attempt doesn't even seem like they thought it out at all.  They're relying purely on the greed and stupidity of their victims. 

I can't believe this even needs to be said (apparently), but nobody in the world is ever going to contact you and tell you that they'll send you more money back if you send them some money first.  It's shocking to me that this type of scam actually works on people.  Most internet goers are aware of the Nigerian Prince scam before they finish grade school.  The real talent of these scammers is in picking victims that aren't aware of this scam.  I'm guessing most of the people behind these scams would make amazing financial advisors if they were steered in the right direction.  Then conning people into giving you money with the expectation of getting more back is legit because the scheme is legal, even though 95% of people using them (which is a lot) would be better off just putting their money in to the S&P 500 and letting these "advisors" go find a real job where they actually provide value. 

Spam call. Ignore them. You phone number probably got leaked somewhere or a crypto related platform sold your data. So they are targeting those crypto users to scam them. And sadly there are people that fall for these kind of scams. It's the same as those email scam where a Nigerian prince left millions of dollars for you. Like, this is basic. Why would they tell you to send 5% of those coins, when they can send you 95% of those coins and keep the rest?

People maybe hold for the longer period. But immediately selling only due to the dry situation occurs. More than half the population in the world are the poor people and middle class general people.So we need of money for the expenses. When the expenses occurs.We obliviously sell the needed funds to the expenses and csah out the crypto currency. It was the common move.So this was major reason for the variation in the price of bitcoin and most of cryptocurrency in a sudden moment.

A lot of good advice has already been given and you should follow the first couple posts in particular. The very fact that you're asking this question is a good thing (before you hand over any money) but it also means you are still susceptible to future scams. You should never "invest" money into projects unless you fully understand them, not just nodding your head along to some salesperson like you pretend to know what is being discussed. You seem to be slowly learning, but you should stick with normal investments like a global index fund and seek out a certified financial advisor if you have a lot of money to spend. People are always pushing get rich quick schemes on the internet and you should assume that all of them are trying to work an angle (you might not see) on you somehow.

That's the problem you don't even know what is the private key and how do you get it.

How did you deposit on the fake company?

The first thing you will do is create a wallet am I right? And then buy Bitcoin to someone or from Exchange unless if you buy directly on exchange and transfer it to the fake company you won't get any private key or backup seed phrase if it was directly from Exchange.

Because if you are using a Bitcoin wallet like sample Electrum wallet it will generate a seed phrase that contains private keys.
That is why most of the people here talk about "Not your keys, Not your Bitcoin" it means you don't own Bitcoin without them.

This statement shows the problem in your mentality. You wish that you had bitcoins in "your name" and you wish to get access to them. Scammers will in future attempt to rub that greed inside you in order to scam you.

There is no such thing as bitcoin's being stored in someone's name.

They are not even stored in your digital wallet if you have one. But they are linked to your private key, which you can generate when generating a wallet. I suggest you read more about this topic and understand that nobody can even claim that you are the owner of some bitcoins unless you give them a proof of the same, like signing a message with your address.

Like I said above, your greed is there and that is weapon the fraudstars will use to scam you again. ::)

You generate your key when creating a new wallet. You never share your private key without anyone, because the one who knows it can spend those coins immediately. So if you never created a wallet, you never owned a private key.

OP, you should follow the advices given by the others because those are the wisest thing to do in your situation right now. Also, you should get yourself educated around crypto market, how does it work and all, but go to the basics first. By doing that, you won’t be easily targeted and fall right off the bait of such scammers and their obvious schemes. It is not your fault that scammers exist and that they are so good at deceiving people in their ways, but we must be smarter and go one step ahead of them if we want to protect ourselves. And that would be possible if we are educated enough.

Are you receiving a text message or a phone call?
If it is phone call,how does the caller's voice sound like?Is he speaking with an accent?
I'm 99% sure that these phone scammers are located in countries like India and Bangladesh,where they have entire call centers of scammers working full time.
There's nothing else you could do except changing your phone number.There's no way to check about any bitcoins "blocked in your name".The whole idea of having some Bitcoins being "blocked in your name" and you having to pay,in order to "unblock" them is simply ridiculous.This is a pretty stupid scam.

OP, for the sake of your (mental) health, change the phone number (and maybe e-mail address too). The scammers have all the time in the world. You don't.
Then, if you want to work with Bitcoin (use it properly), do a little bit of basic learning, so you know what you're doing. If you still have or you'll ever buy bitcoin again, I suggest you consider buying a hardware wallet and transfer your funds there.
Ah, and stop believing the too good to be true stories....

Thanks a lot for the advice.

For now, I am not trading in anything, crypto or shares. I let the bank do it.

I have learned my lesson (scammed once).

If I ever decide to start investing again in crypto or shares, I will first get complete knowledge and only then start something.

Thanks again for the input.

One f you asked if scammers have an accent -
The scammers have an accent most of the time, but sometimes they are from England, Denmark, the USA, and everywhere. I guess this global.

Regards,
Andy

Unfortunately, the data has now become valuable, as when you register for any service, and when it does not have the financial resources, they may sell part of the data to these scammers who try to use it to scam others, and so on, and therefore, in general, use a personal email address / phone number and don't post it in public or with any unknown services.

Remember no one calls you to give you money, greed is what makes you believe it.

Regarding calls to your phone number, I can say your phone can be leaked by the websites where you gave them your phone number because there are many websites where they buy and sell huge amounts of active phone numbers to scammers and advisers or many this can be from your friends but regardless of who gave them your phone number I suggest you block their phone number and never answer them again because your phone number cannot be linked to your bitcoin wallets address and the only way is to hold your coins in some exchange with your phone number.

Thanks for opening a topic here, because this will definitely enlighten many people to remain cautious against such scammers.

I guess if you are into bitcoin/cryptocurrencies investments then you should go for studying few of basics of bitcoin ecosystem so that you may not get scammed easily.

For the above scenario, you should ignore all such calls as there would be no possibilities for blocking bitcoin in a decentralized environment. I guess now itself you must report them in cyber crime police if available in your country.

These people would do anything to steal some money from you.  This might be outside crypto and I just want to share it for awareness, but some would even attempt to do such "refund scam" to you claiming that they refunded too much money from you after you revoke whatever non-existent service that they're claiming that you bought and they would want you to pay that "extra money" through gift cards and oh boy, if they heard that you're holding crypto, they would call you again with another spoofed number claiming that they're from whatever support of custodial wallet you're holding your cryptos.

Would you mind sharing that screenshot here ^{[I'm interested in seeing the URL part]}?
^{Note: Don't forget to censor/blur the sensitive parts!}

There's always the option of ignoring calls from unknown numbers.

What kind of trading is the bank in question, doing on your behalf?

Apparently people still fall for the old Nigerian Prince scam (Also called : Advance-fee scam), because these people are still trying to do it.  ;D

An advance-fee scam is a form of fraud and is one of the most common types of confidence tricks. The scam typically involves promising the victim a significant share of a large sum of money, in return for a small up-front payment, which the fraudster claims will be used to obtain the large sum. If a victim makes the payment, the fraudster either invents a series of further fees for the victim to pay or simply disappears.

Source : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advance-fee_scam

I think the targets for these scams are people who are new to the Internet or older people who are desperate to increase or double their savings. (They do not have work, so they do anything to get a little extra money)  >:( >:( >:(

Yeah, if it is senior they're going to come back and ask for more of whatever payment they want. It is really depressing as I heard that some would even claim to be a police  and would charge these people due to a non-existent charges that were done against them.  Some would also claim to be an IRS.
Most common method used by scammers to older people is the tech support scam for obvious reasons and yeah it still happens until this day.

No it's not! Unless you have any rich father who has left behind these assets for you there is no way someone has blocked anything in your name. Any bitcoin lying anywhere can be operated with the private key which you will have. If you don't have it then this company should be having it but if they have it they will just take away all the money why only settle for 5% so don't trust any such scheme

This sentence is very familiar and most will also end like this. Be patient and get a lesson from this. So sorry to hear that.
If we have been scammed and we have lost our money in crypto investment with a fake company, I am sure enough that the probability to get back the money is extremely small may be zero.

Don't believe it too easy again, moreover if they ask for some money again from you. They will just deceive you and get your money more and more. but I am quite curious why they can call you? Did you give them your phone number? You may tract it from their phone number, right?

First, you may wonder why it becomes Bitcoin blocked in your name and I don't know how they know your name, the last one is Bitcoin block doesn't own by anyone or there's a name on it.  When there's asking money to get larger money after you deposited to them, that's a scam.  Just try troll at them too but never give any amount to them.

This is very common on the Telegram platform(a house of theft) which is someone calling you, asking you for investment, or rather seeking help which acts like they have an account on exchange but they can't withdraw.  You can block/ignore them so that they can't make any calls again. (that's a perfect solution)