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Crypto scammers, pose a serious threat to users. These harmful programs unlawfully take cryptocurrency from victims' wallets using various tactics, such as launching campaigns, creating deceptive websites, making connections to wallets, interacting with smart contracts, transferring assets, and using obscuration.

To break it down, a crypto drainer uses a harmful program designed to swipe cryptocurrency from your wallet. They work by fooling you into approving transactions that allow the attacker to move your funds elsewhere, often without your knowledge or consent.

Scam Sniffer, a provider of anti-scam solutions, found a series of attacks by crypto drainer malware that stole around $59 million from 63,210 victims. This was done by embedding a wallet drainer called MS Drainer in Google searches and X (formerly Twitter) ads. The attack campaign uses malicious ads on Google and X to redirect users to phishing pages.

Read more...
https://www.cryptocrit.xyz/2023/12/google-and-x-ads-are-new-weapon-for.html

This is why you need to be conscious of the links you see online, most of the trusted links are from sites like Coingecko, if you want to visit a project website, use the links from Coingecko because it must have been vetted already, there are a lot of scammers out there, not just on Google or X ads, there are a lot of ways they can penetrate one if care is not taken, just be sure of links you want to click before doing so

Scammers are always on those sites to lure people or visitors of the net to be victimized. And newbies who have not gotten enough knowledge about internet links are the ones always fall for these kind of traps. These few days to Christmas, Telegram and Facebook were flooded with the so called cryptocurrency investment links and once I sight them I would report them or I would attacked them so it is not much again in Facebook but for the Google, you can't report them so you let them flow but be careful with them and don't click any link that you are not trusted.

You know, you have your wallet in the particular device which you are using to browse then don't click any link but if your device which you are using is not the one you have your wallets then you can click the links to see the content in it.

There is need to trade with caution especially in the social media because scammers are advancing everyday with new strategies in order to lure people.

However compelling the link is you must examine it before clicking it, don't just click any link you see in the social network.
And I think Google and X has a role to play in reducing this thread before they advertise any paid ads, they should try and examine the links provided by this people paying for the ads.

Upon reading this thread, I think that it was the same or connected to the thread that was recently created by @Amphenomenon on the Beginners & Help board.  
It's Our Dependency on Google (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5479382.0).
There's a guide there that you can read on how to protect yourself from a possible scam in Google ads.

As I can say, we should be careful when clicking link ads on Google, because some ads use clickbait tactics to attract users' attention just to click the link.

We must spread awareness after falling victim to phishing attacks, fraudulent advertisements, social attacks and other fraudulent methods. Many still believe advertisements and pop-up windows that tell them that they have won a car or that there is a paid vacation waiting for them and they must fill out the data. Clicking on links and mishandling phones leads to leakage. More data about you means more likely to be exposed to this scam.

Crypto drainers are bad programs that steal cryptocurrency from people wallets. Scammers trick people into letting them transfer money without them knowing. They take the stolen money and leave the victims with nothing.

It is very important for people to be careful and do things to keep themselves safe from these scams. It is helpful to learn about the different tricks that scammers use and to know about the newest ways to stay safe.

Especially I will say the newbies should be careful from these kind of scams. Because the scammers are inventing new and new programs to grab money from people. So always be careful while touching any suspicious link or even connecting your to a new website or to and unverified Dex.

With the recent increase of investors in the world of cryptocurrencies along with it is the increase in scammers trying to cheat their way through life

There are so many different ways of getting coins from your wallet without your awareness and phishing is only one of them and if you are naturally gullible then you will definitely fall victim to these scams

Some newly launched coins are even scams or those who give airdrops so it is extremely important that we always stay informed and vigilant never get tired of researching

They both were always weapons of crypto scammers unless the user remains vigilant. After X.com started selling the blue tick it has now become easier for scammers to get that tick and exploit users. Earlier it wasn't possible to scam users easily on that platform. I have seen a lot of fake websites that come up on Google searches and some are in the form of advertisements. It is imperative to always check the URL before using these websites to prevent oneself from getting scammed.

I am not sure about X but Google is known for it and in many searches they always show the clone site at the top of the results at a sponsored spot over the actual website and this shows how bad Google ad scrutinization is when it comes to promoting ads.

Don't trust the google results so blindly since everything is driven by money now, so scammers are ready to invest few thousands to milk few hundred thousands.

This is problem with these platform that anyone can place any ads if they spend some money. If a project needs to be verified by the team or any 3rd party to run ads in google or twitter then we would have seen a quite improvement in the ad industry as well. Though it is practically expensive to do, this is just an idea. Every time I go into twitter some ICO sale pops up or some dude asks about minting NFTs. By seeing all these, I do realize that we should cross check a project to other legit platforms if we get to know about it on social media and interested in it.

It's a problem almost everywhere, lol. People should learn how to be safe on the internet and how not to click on every link and perhaps these scams would become less big and common.

Correct since if we are not aware of scams posted everywhere then we will be the easy target of those scammers. I don't know why google accept this ads since its really bothering to see that exist since it could potentially harm those newbies since they would really think that offers they could see advertise on google is true and they might get scammed for their beliefs that they can earn if they commit their time and money with them. There's lot of scammers everywhere so we need to determine which is true and not since if the posted words is so to good to be true I guess people need to declare for their selves that is shady and mostly scammers offer that so they will not get tempted then can avoid experiencing any unfortunate loss.

Right, not the first time that we have seen this kind of attacks, and even before crypto though, Google has been used by scammers and criminals. Now it's just magnified as crypto is now becoming the buzz word and everyone jump on the bandwagon.

And as others have said, don't used Google to search for crypto projects as you might fall for that trap. Or just save and bookmark the legit links if you have it already.

As the attacks is prevalent, we should be very careful and do due diligence.

It was never this way, the X and Google security to it's user was actually top notch, any contrary activity suspected will definitely get such account banned and question. Seems a lot has changed this has now become the den for scammers and advertisement of scam adds.
It has now become like the Telegram where you don't go a day with out being contacted by this scammers. It is left for us to decide whether to be scammed or not

Not surprised by this because fraudsters also need a crowded place so that the action can be successful and give a lot of money to him, that's why we really need to be aware of all forms of fraud and do not trust the things that are offered on the internet especially if it has promised a large income Because basically there will be nothing easy in this world to make money all need hard work and patience, but it's a shame not all realize it and they are easily fooled by all forms of offers on Google and social media.

This is not new in the crypto space, it's just a period of intense activity where users pay a lot of attention to the market and scammers do their work. And the main problem is still up to users to raise awareness to protect their own assets during contact with the crypto market. I also hear a lot about theft attacks and the distribution of unique code that takes over users' rights to use of wallets,... but these vulnerabilities are like a challenge for the market to grow more and more, so we must adapt to them and be wary of information on social media.

Still want to reiterate that OP can shorten links from your posts.

This is nothing new. Outside of crypto sites, advertising fraud is already a big problem on Google Ads. In the last few months I have clicked on ads from supposedly large companies several times (even the domain was identical) and then ended up on some scam site. Google has become very lax when it comes to checking such ads. This will certainly also happen with crypto advertising that is permitted again, probably even on a larger scale. There is a good article about this.
article (https://securityboulevard.com/2022/05/how-scammers-use-google-ads-to-target-brands-customers/)

There have been enough topics discussing about the same thing, so why create another topic? If you have nothing in your mind then please do not create such topics which are repeaters. Unless you quote something unique that scammers have now started. I do not think such topics should be allowed on the altcoin board, while, the same topics related to Google, X.com, Facebook, Telegram, and what not are being posted on the Beginners board.

Coming back to what OP wrote, it is evident that scammers use social media platforms to scam. Why not stop using social media to prevent getting scammed? I mean we know how social media works, so why not keep yourself away from those platforms? If not then ignore any lucrative or free offers. The reason being such post are being created by scammers.

Nothing new with this. Crypto scammers have always been using twitter and google ads. Just like any medium and chatter that crypto people are following.

This goes as far as i can remember. It just have become more profitable for scammers as more and more people are aware of cryptos in some way. Advertising them in google in 2015 didn't make as much sense as most of the people didn't even know how to buy them. Or how to interact with them.

If we know where and how scammers employ their weapons, that alone is sufficient to make us cautious when encountering any advertisement in the first search results on Google or any tweet posted on an account on platform X, even if the account is verified with a checkmark and has thousands of followers. Indeed, we should not take any ads on phone applications, or even those promoted on social media or search engines, lightly without conducting thorough research. Most beginners might believe that the mere presence of an advertisement in the top search results and on social media platforms means it is legitimate, endorsed, and reviewed. However, there is not enough oversight, and there is no effective means to prevent scammers from exploiting these ads.

there has been so many mention in the past where quite literally these scammers are just promoting their scam phishing through google ads, even back then they are promoting their scams by impersonating some popular site like binance using google ads and the like its no wonder that these are kept being used by these scammers for the simple fact that these advertising service never try to check their own ads submission they just care about money.

its kinda funny since if i remember correctly google was banning metaverse back then from using their ads but allow scam phishing to be advertised by their services.
thats why its never recommended to click on google ads or something like that, the information on CMC in regard of coin and token if you want to make some analysis about fundamental or finding out some project are more accurate and better than trying to search in google where its just full of some random ads thats more likely to be scam.

It is logical to accept that everyone will not be tech-savvy. There are a generation gap between tech and non tech people and there are still people who are from nineties so they are not that used to all those internet things. Also sometimes those ads show something on the frontend but they have used phishing links on the back end. People don't get conscious as long as they fall for a tarp and learn the lesson. These types of people still exist in the new generation, and the only thing we can do is expect some spread awareness measures from these platforms.

with an increasing amount of links in circulation one should be very careful with the kind of link he clicks because almost all the links in circulation now are aimed at catching and stealing from ignorant people.

I almost fell victim of clicking on a scam link on x before i finally did a check on the authenticity on the link online, after going through the recommendations, i had to avoid that blogger totally.
Before clicking or going into any project, do the necessary research so you won't fall victim.

That's why Google banned crypto ads 5 years ago until now, the regulation on crypto 5 years ago wasn't really clear on each country, and google doesn't want to have trouble in those country, but now since most of country in the world have pretty clear regulation and policy on crypto then google is going to lift the ban.

With the new policy of crypto google ads, they should have better filter to prevent scammer to use the google ads.

I'm aware of them using this new method of scamming their ignorant victims because they are taking advantage of these features and they are doing this because they are getting more money from them and there are lots of them who got fooled by this. In order to prevent yourself from getting victim trust only the official site of the exchanges or any project that you currently invested your money with because if ever they have some freebies or airdrops, they will first announce it there. not from any random sites that we are currently getting from random emails or on some social media.

Just don't click any links and advertisements that you feel suspicious even on trusted websites. Using an adblock is really useful just to block these kind of things, sure you won't get personalized ads but it doesn't matter anyway because most of the advertisements are really garbage. Check everything before you interact and explore the website, do virustotal check, do some quick search about the stuff you search etc.

The scammers still have a lot of way to scam us, not with google ads but I have seen through youtube channels and videos to scam those innocent people. There will be lot of those.

Maybe because you don't use X that much? It's not strict as Facebook and others, Which is why scammers loves to lurk on here. The popular scheme that happens here is the fake giveaway and donation. Google is strict so I'm not sure about that thing you are accusing to them. When I search in Google, you are right that there is a sponsored site and its URL is a bit different.

But, I think once you visit them, you will still be redirected on the original site. It happens because you are being referred by someone else. Those clone/phished sites are still different to it, and they are mostly found in social media sites, in our emails, the forum, and the messaging platforms that we are using.

But then when it comes to links, there’s not way to tell what is what anyways because we’re all online, everything is digital. So technically, you everything needs link because that is what navigates you to what you want online. Imagine you see an ad that matches your interest, you’ll innocently click on it. But what I think about this is that maybe those people who get scammed did a little bit more than clicking the link. Because, there’s no way we all haven’t click on such a link before, but somehow not everyone has been scammed. IDK, just thinking.

It isn't a news in the crypto space anymore that fake hypes are often made by some influencers on both Google and X ads to scams investors. This is why making research before investing in any project is highly important.

These platforms don't have a strong will to disable and eliminate scams that are using them to advertise. But instead, as long as there's a hefty money that's being paid to them by these scammers to operate and launch their campaigns there, they'll turn a blind eye to it.
And they are only going to act if they have received some reports on them because that's how they respond to the users but they don't have an actual process to stop their operations on their platforms.

So you don't know google like I didn't know about X much but Google is no saint here and I personally saw few fake websites at the top because they paid them and then we can find the actual websites but its nothing related to crypto so I am not going to name them.

And what you are saying is also true and that is used by referral earners to pop websites with their referrals over the real site.

The use of ads is one of the tools companies are using to advertise their products and get people to be aware of their products.
The smae way companies are utilizing the use of ads to increase awareness, the same way scammers too are using it to advertise there fake products and deceive people in investing their funds in projects that don't have any usefulness. We just need to be very careful making financial decisions because any mistake could cost our problems that might take years to be adjust and resolved.

Don't just click anything.
Ever since I joined cryptocurrencies advertising, marketing, and investing, that had been my motto. I don't want to just click anything because there's a chance I will bump into the things that you have said. Scams, phishing, and more. Also, because I have been a victim of phishing that is why I learned my lesson.
Recently, I fixed a phone of a friend which is filled with different advertising and pornography notifications from Google Chrome itself in an Android application from Google Play. I asked if he is watching porn and he said no as I look into his eyes I can see that he is telling the truth. I also asked if he was into dating applications. He also said no. I tried looking at his browsing history and I saw none. FYI: This friend is already 60 years of age and just still working in carpentry and construction. He is mostly not around due to work.
I cannot find where he got it so I just fixed his phone cleared everything about Chrome and uninstalled it in his phone. A week later he told me nothing was popping out anymore.
We must be careful about what we click either in social media or even in our browsers. Hackers have now found a way to inject anything through those ads.

It's a good indicator of bull market. Ads like that appears every bull run