Bitcoin Forum

Bitcoin investment has been so good to people, but to some they got scammed because they invest in a wrong platform, and now with the way things are going scammer are alway busy creating fake website to scam people

My question is that how can someone dictate a fake website? because is getting too much, is there anyway the comonas need to know things like this if there is any.

They don't invest in a platform but invest on wrong platform, a phishing site. They invest their money in Bitcoin or altcoins, not in any centralized exchange platform. However, if they use a phishing site of a centralized exchange, deposit money on it, they will lose what they deposit.

The problem starts with how did they know about that phishing site.

Did they know about it through their friends?
If so, their friends are either scammers, part of that phishing site scam team, or your friends were scammed too.

The recommendation is "Don't trust, verify"
We all can start with big websites in cryptocurrency market like Coinmarketcap.com, Coingecko.com and find information of cryptocurrency exchanges or projects.

If by 'invest' you mean websites where you send some money and they hold your Bitcoin for you with a interest of a certain percent at certain periods, someone starting out should not be doing this. I don't even recommend it for anyone at all too because you're investing through a third party.
The only platform you need is where you can buy Bitcoin and where you can store your bitcoins.

• Bookmark important websites so you don't have to always type them out,
• Verify the details of the website on who.is
• Fake websites usually change a letter or the TLD, for example the original in bitcointalk.org, a scammer will create a clone with .com instead, hoping someone will mistakenly type that out.
• Don't follow random links to locate important websites.

You can verify the website's contact information. Check out the website's customer support. Check the reputation of the website. See what other reviewers have given about it. Scam websites make very tempting and unrealistic offers. If you see the website offering you an unrealistic return on investment then ignore it.

The easiest step is to check the fake site on the platform trustpilot (https://www.trustpilot.com/). You just enter the site and see what the scores and reviews are from friends there.

If you want to be even more convincing, try to investigate yourself starting from large cryptomarkets such as CMC (https://coinmarketcap.com/) and CG (https://www.coingecko.com/). Phishing sites are usually very similar in appearance and so on to the original site, but the URL will not be the same. So, check the URL before you decide to enter your identity or account there.

Pretty simple: only use websites(with finance in general, not only bitcoin/crypto) that are established already and have a good following with a good enough reputation. Stay away from lesser-known platforms, especially the newer ones.

Also: https://chainsec.io/scams

Why would you be investing in a website at all? If you are buying Bitcoin, then that's your investment, not the site. If you are talking about some staking feature, those have a tendency to go bankrupt or run away with the invested money. You shouldn't do it. But if you understand the risks and don't care, well, don't cry when things go south.

Buying bitcoin isn't difficult.
Purchase it P2P or from a trusted CEX/DEX.
Move the coins to your wallet.
Hold it.
Sell it or spend it according to your own needs.

That's it. One does not need to be an expert or be "investing in a fake website."   

TrustPilot is not a very reliable site to check for the legitimacy of a website - it is very easy for a scam site to buy positive feedback on TrustPilot to deceive people who don’t know how to do proper research.

If you take a look at some sites that have been reported has scam here in Bitcointalk - you’ll see that some of them still have people that constantly post positive reviews on TrustPilot meanwhile whose that have managed to maintain a good reputation here are being bombarded with negative reviews on TrustPilot - if a newbie should follow those reviews they’ll end up following a scam site.

Your answer is Bitcointalk. If someone want to invest in Bitcoin and they are not sure that which site is legit and which site is a fake one or a phishing site, they should create a thread on Bitcointalk and ask about it in that thread.

On this forum you'll get genuine information about the platforms that are legit and you can also get information about the fake platforms or phishing sites. The community is always present to help out the newbies who aren't sure about Bitcoin investment.

In this forum there's a child board named Scam Accusations where people can learn about the scam platforms, but a user need to read the threads carefully because sometimes haters also create fake scam accusations against legit platforms. However, with some reading you can understand that if a platform is a legit one or a scam one.

And that's why this great community is helping each other and giving advisories to the potential scams that we're seeing. Once you've grown your way here and gained enough knowledge, you'll start to have your own factors in determining potential scams too. As a return, you'd be helping others in spotting those likely scam platforms and schemes. A shortcut? you can always see people that are not familiar with the websites they discover ask here.

With all of the tips, you have to remember the most common ones. One of it is looking some small details if the website is professionally made and not, which means that if it doesn't look professional then it's already a red flag. But, don't be too confident about the professionally made because they're likely the ones that aren't noticed by most folks. Looking at the details as they've said through simple search through search engines will show you results. And best way if you're going to buy Bitcoin, do it on most common exchanges.

Many fake platforms try to scam unsuspecting users by offering them mouth watering returns for investing their Bitcoin and other crypto assets with them. So whenever you see this, just run for your life and don't go closer. Bookmark important crypto websites to minimize the chances of visiting a cloned website and avoid unsolicited PMs from strangers, they're mostly scammers trying to deceive you to invest in a fake project or to lure you to visit a phishing website.

There are many ways to detect for a fake website, but if you think you don't know any of these means, you can learn on others experience to be assured of being on the right platform, but know this that bitcoin is not required to be on any platform, you make use of p2p to acquire it and you may have to understand the way this operates under a decentralized network of blockchain, for you to be able to read broader, learn from this aspect on how to spot a fake website https://nordvpn.com/blog/fake-scam-websites/

1. If you don't fundamentally understand how something works, then it's not for you, and you shouldn't invest.
2. If the profit offer is too good, it is most likely a scam.
3. Always do your research, if that's not enough, read number 1 again

If it was actually created greatly its gonna be difficult to know if it is a fake website if you just see it the first time, I mean most of the scam websites and completely running well before they would end up shutting down and running away with your money, so there was no actual way but to do some research about the website, so that you could identify some red flags and with that you could assume its risk when putting your money or investment on it. Even here in the forum I think there was a thread of fake platforms here that you could check.

The best thing to do, is just avoid suspicious websites first, just go for a trusted website already so that you can avoid getting scammed with the hack websites, Most of the time it's on the links that we click so be mindful as well with the links that you click online because there are a lot of websites that have similar links but the different domain you might end up clicking the wrong one. The next one is getting too good-to-be-true deals, most of the time if a website promises a huge amount that is already a red flag since it wasn't going to be profitable for them to run and give that much of money. Lastly is always be updated with the community, I mean hackers and scammers are trying new methods and creating new websites everytime just trying to scam you so make sure to be updated with the community, like here in the forum there are a lot of topics here for awareness of new types of scam or modus etc.

there are many phishing websites created by scammers to deceive potential bitcoin investors. usually they make this website very similar to the original, and therefore visitors need to be careful and always verify whether the website is really a credible and trusted website or in accordance with the platform they are visiting. users should be able to use several tools such as web advisors to see whether the website is genuine or they can check the legitimacy of the website by discussing it in forums, and there are many other ways that users can do to prevent themselves from being scammed or hacked.

Most of the newbies do not have much knowledge about cryptos and phishing sites. So for me, as a newbie, you should always DYOR and ask about the site if it's legit or not you can ask it here or bring it to Reddit and any crypto-related forums.
Because that is the best source to know if the site where you invest is legit or not.

Also, take note of the site registered date because most of the newly published sites are scams.

Keep your bitcoins offline, if you have your wallet in the same device that you use to browse the internet and visit lots of websites, then you can possibly lose your money. To download crypto wallets and stuffs, do not do it through playstore or app store, download them through their original website.

Your coins is never safe if you keep it in the same device you use to browse the internet and visit different websites, such as adult sites for example. Even if you get into the correct websites, your device can be infected with malwares when you visit such sites.

You can check the reputation of the website on scamadviser.com. They show a detailed analysis of the website as well as reviews of other people. You can then make an informed decision about the website. It usually comes out like this:

https://i.ibb.co/NnZxpCx/IMG-4981.jpg (https://ibb.co/S7RN0yN)

https://www.scamadviser.com/check-website/valhadex.com

But a website is not made for investment, so why do you have to invest in any website? If you see anyone asking you to invest in any website, you should know it’s a scam, so you don’t even have to identify any scam websites. You can learn more about bitcoin on different websites, but you should never invest your money in any website.
 
If you want to invest, then visit any reputable exchange, purchase your bitcoin from the exchange, and send your bitcoin to a non custodial wallet. Never leave your bitcoin even on exchange, no matter how reputable the exchange is. Any exchange can fail at any moment, and if you have money in the exchange, then everything will be gone.

If you are not good at recognizing scam sites, it is best to ask in communities like this one - before you decide to invest money.  People here can be a great resource for spotting red flags.

The first thing you need to do is to use common sense. Any website that offer high returns is mist likely a scam. Remember the saying:"when it sounds too good to be true, it probably is".
Do your own research like checking how old the website is, the validity of the company's license.. You can also read reviews of other customers but do not rely too much on that as some reviews might be fake.
If you still have some doubts, you can always ask here.

Trustpilot reviews offer some value, but should not be the sole factor when evaluating a website's legitimacy.  Counterfeit sites have become adept at manipulating reviews to appear authentic.  Just like fake products, there are also fake reviews.  Scammers can pay for positive reviews or write them themselves to make a website seem legit.

What you say is also true, but it's still a better step to see the extent of the website's legitimacy from there, while also carrying out a deeper screening of the website or investment service provider. If you are able to carry out your own investigation, even better and you will be able to convince yourself how appropriate it is for us to put money there.

But whatever platform you invest in, be sure to be cautious before investing, and use the major website CoinMarketCap to find out if you are a phishing site. This will allow you to verify that any website is genuine, and essentially you will not be dealing with investing in any platform other than Bitcoin. Invest in Bitcoin to be sure your investment will be successful, Altcoin investors invest at their own risk and there is a high possibility of losses.

They got scammed because they wanted to make quick money, and for everyone that comes into this space as a beginner with the hope to make money fast is vulnerable to mistakes, they have greed in them and that will be the reason they will make every mistake possible.

Beginners don't always have the time to do research, it is only those that don't have money decide to do some research first before they eventually have some money.

A point of correction, beginners shouldn't be investing in any platform, this is crypto world, beginners should hunt for Bitcoin first, because it is less complex than investing in any other things.

It is very easy to do something wrong in the crypto world, beginners must always take their time to do research first before giving up their money.

It could be very dangerous to rely solely on CoinMarketCap. Sure, it's the most popular platform in that line of business, but its popularity also makes it a prime target of hackers. They wouldn't have to deface the site. All they would have to do is replace some genuine links with their own fake phishing sites. If you only rely on CoinMarketCap to direct you to other websites, you might find yourself in problems if something like that happened.

You are correct and to add to what you said, ⁴. They should reduce their greed level, ⁵. Always avoid such website that promise huge profits in returns.

And again, you know its very important to ask questions because of the newbies or let me say beginners don't really care about asking questions to know things they don't know, most importantly here is an open place where people can easily brought some things they seems not to understand how it functions to people that knows how it works and they could explain more better. Sometimes, these newbies hide it from people and wanting to be smart in everything maybe, since the profits they would gain from that site is too huge they wouldn't want to waste any further time hence might lead them to easily get scammed by those site.

In order to recognize your own greed level index, a lot of analysis is required, and it isn't easy to analyze yourself.
The one who can do that can certainly control his greed.


Check rule number 2 I mentioned  ;)

Trustpilot is worst way to check of fake websites, anyone can create an account there and can make a review. Best thing to do is check google with an ad blocker browser (to avoid scams in google ads), check reddit, bitcointalk, and other community related forums.
Remember, a too good to be true offer is always suspicious and should be avoid of.

You are correct sir, although sometimes we can still control our greed index and, within ourselves whenever we are doing something wrong there is this thing that first speak to you quickly saying "this is wrong" and for someone who can listen to it quickly can likely stop doing wrong things, if only that person has conscience then it could be controlled, or alternatively when desperado is removed then greed is easily to be eliminated. I can picture in myself there, let say few day ago a friend of mine, I mean a fellow gender sent me a  site to sign up and I could likely received 86k worth my local currency  (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5496008.msg64058594#msg64058594) and when I clicked on the site I read some things and it seems not to be true for me so I had to copy the site name to track on who.is/whois (https://who.is/whois/money-easilynpl.buzz) and I found out that site is fake.

Sorry my bad ::)

Some people won't do this, because they seem to trust the sender too much and they may not even be conscientious. Especially if they are indeed beginners. But I want to add actually if this person has been in the forum, he can take advantage of this discussion forum to provide validation of that website. Although it takes a little time, but I feel confident this forum will give an honest answer.

Platform or site, both means the same thing, it’s just how a person decide present it.

Then, its true to say that, everything start from how the person use in the discovery of this site in question. Now, you just see a website from somewhere, website you had no knowledge of before and base on, the promises see on it, that you don’t get to lose money, it’s risk free and their return on investment wound be regular and in an unbelievable amount with few testimonials to prove, you chose to proceed with an investment because, you feel it’s just what you were looking for and even go ahead preach it to other of your friends to join in too.

No, that shouldn’t be the case. Truths be told, many websites today are clones of the original. Always be very inquisitive before you invest through any platform and this follow that, you ask questions. One of the places you can verify platforms or websites is to ask on this forum. Here, a lot of people get to take up the research on the website for you, especially when you ask on the reputation board.
Another way to check for negative testimonials about them and what’s there trust score on pilot study. This will give you knowledge on how many pilot users yo have undergone the process in them, when the site was created, the duration of their registration certificate or license and other details that could give you the right or wrong impression about the site, coupled with what response you get from the forum to guide you on what’s the possible verdict.

Once you fear or the feedback you get from your findings and response from the forum no nice, you commot body.

Back when I was still active on telegram, I saw a lot of scam groups and fake websites. I made it a point to expose these scam websites. These are some points you should pay attention to be able to spot a scam site;
• Look for grammar errors - scammers usually make typos in their website information.
• Unrealistic returns of investment - if it’s too good to be true, it’s a scam.
• Website about information - scammers cannot help but be ingenuous. Their about profile is usually copied from another website. Also check their team, if you can google the pictures of their supposed team you will find these people are not in the crypto business irl.
• How long the site claim to be in existence vs how long the sites has been in existence according to scamadviser.com
• Search the url on https://www.bitcoinabuse.com

Do not trust anyone.
This is a forum crawling with scammers just like the rest of the Internet. There are a lot of willing, honest members but there's no guarantee that they'll be the first to comment to an inquiry and enough time could have passed for someone to log into the wrong website and they steal their log in details and breach their accounts.

Always validate information yourself as much as you can.

omg another unreadable useless thread.
ok i'll entertain you.
just go to their official twitter, use the link posted there and bookmark it. only use that bookmark and no other link.
that way you won't get phished (unless their site gets hacked of course :))

Detecting fake platform is simple, no matter the graphics designs, always ensure to contact your colleagues that's more advanced and you also have access to bitcointalk to throw your questions. Scams are everywhere in the market, we shouldn't give up but pressed on tight budgets that will be executed on our ends. This space is broad, the more reason we should be careful because if we relent, definitely we'll lose huge capital which is meant for another projects. I'm very careful and personally watch my steps because to grow in the space, one needs to abide by principles.

Even if a scammer (assuming the account has not been tagged) is the first to reply to the thread, it would be of no consequence because surely the OP should be smart enough to get a response from multiple users before deciding on what to do. As long as the thread remains open, other members would give their own opinions and openly tackle the scammer. Even though scam is not moderated, the community members have zero tolerance for scam and would never let it happen.

 

Some beginners and new investors may make a mistake in choosing the legitimate platform on which they will deposit their funds for investment or purchase Bitcoin. These fake or phishing sites may have been found through search engines, promoted as advertisements, sent to them by strangers, or discovered through their email.

It is very easy to identify and detect these fake domains and scam sites that mimic the official domains of famous platforms by conducting necessary research, checking reviews and ratings, and using browser extensions like Scam Sniffer as an excellent solution for anti-scam and identifying scam websites. Also, whoever has bookmarked the official domain links of these platforms and activated notifications for their official social media accounts is certainly on the safe side, as they will be obliged to deal only with these legitimate links only and avoid others. It is also advised to avoid new and unrated platforms and instead deal with reliable, established, and top platforms in this field.

You're assuming everyone is smart enough to know steps to take to prevent themselves from getting scammed. That's not the reality, I have seen people fall for less obvious scams, some even take advice they get in their dms where no one else can chime in.

My initial advice holds true, don't trust, verify.

You've given the two best recommendations as far as I'm concerned, when choosing a website to buy or invest in Bitcoin, or any other assets, it is 'don't trust, verify first. Even when your loved ones whom you trust introduces you to any websites that you can invest or make quick money on a short time, don't take their words for it because you trust them, because they might have sent it to you as received, it doesn't mean that they've cautiously verified it. When dealing in Bitcoin, it's best to get information from renowned crypto platforms like coingecko and cointelegraph, it helps to focus on these  known sources to avoid scams.

Yes that is right investing in Bitcoin is good for many people but some lost money because they used fake websites. It is scary that scammers keep making fake websites to make fool people and institutions should speed up work to catch them

To avoid fake websites we should keep in mind these points.

1...Check website address. Scammers mostly make addresses that are just similar to real website but they make little difference.

2...Make sure website is secure. Real websites usually have (https) at start of address and lock icon in address bar.

3...Research website. Look for reviews and information about people who run it.Be careful if there is little information or bad reviews about the website.

4...Be wary of promises that sound too good to be true. Scammers mostly promise very high returns or guarantee success.

5...Keep your computer and antivirus software up to date to protect against online threats.

It is good for people to learn how to spot fake websites and avoid scams. And as I mentioned above authorities and online platforms should work together to stop fake websites and keep people safe online. So this can reduce the ratio of scamming.

What do you mean by fake website? Bitcoin investment doesn't have anything to do with a generic website. If you want to buy Bitcoin or make investment in Bitcoin, all you have to do is to make use of any decentralized available exchange or centralized ones and the only way to avoid been phised is to go to coingecko >> click on exchanges tab and you will see list on all the available exchange, click on any of them and buy your Bitcoin, then withdraw your Bitcoin to an external wallet; it's as simple as that.

People that you see get scams from website are ignorant of Bitcoin investment, you don't invest in Bitcoin from any website and you don't fall for the scams where they promised to give you a percentage in return from investment, they are scams especially when you see 10% return and above on Bitcoin investment, I repeat they are scams.

That is true, people are more gullible than they like to think. We cannot control what goes on in the dms, this is always the case whenever a newbie asks a question on an open platform. Scammers see this as an open invitation, this is why it is important for beginners to cultivate a habit of skepticism and being suspicious of dms they receive from strangers on the internet.

They should not entertain any dms especially if it comes from unknown person and if they offer something strange since usually we can always conclude that there's nothing good to happen there but rather we can always get a scam offers coming from them. This is why its important to have critical think and be skeptical on what we see so that this scammers or fake website creators will not scam us. There so many ways for newbie to verify if what they see is true and they can always ask people here since for sure they can get a correct answer from a lot of helpful people here.

Its understandable that its hard for newbies to understand those new information to them but frequent asking question can help them figure out the right answer on the questions bothering in their minds.

As a newbie,their are several things you need to learn and master if you are to be successful online,because you are in this forum,some other person's are online looking for some other things to do that will fetch them money,and that is scamming.There are several fake items online,designed to attract the attention of people who are newbie,so they can lure them.But when you've known these,there is every tendency that you will know how to avoid them and their tactics.
One need to be very careful so he or she won't be a victim to scammers here.

I am little confusing with OP question about fake website, actually when investing in bitcoin need purchasing bitcoin trough exchange wallet and most important to check about trust website to avoid with fake website.
Usually I search trusted or real website link trough twitter account or telegram channel and looking there which one real website or not.

All important website from metamask wallet until some exchange wallet have been bookmark in my browser, its easily way how to avoid our self from fake website and not get wrong when investing in bitcoin. I think checking with the media social account and looking there every exchange or wallet have linked their website and make us avoid about which one real or fake website before accessing it.

I don't exactly remember Mane of the website since it's deleted now and even the person who tried trapping me to this website has deleted all the conversation and blocked me in Telegram, I guess it was in the year 2018 when I was introduced to a site based out of China as they claims which could offer us weekly returns of we keep our funds in their exchange as they promised something like they would pay us the profit they get out of trading fees but figured out it's fake due to reviews in Google when checked about the site. I think we shouldn't be experimenting with unknown platforms and need to check the URL carefully which using exchanges via website not app.

Fake websites have always existed until now because they were created deliberately by the fraudsters themselves for the purpose of deceiving more people forever. I don't know what website you are referring to, but if you want to invest in Bitcoin for a long duration. You only need to buy Bitcoin on a well-known exchange or on an exchange that is running in your own country and then store it in a safer private wallet. Because investing in Bitcoin has nothing to do with any platform except only the exchange where you want to buy a certain amount of Bitcoin and move it into a wallet that you manage yourself, because it is not recommended to store it on the exchange or on any platform.

Scammers always use phishing techniques to create fake websites that contain malware. Quite a lot of events and casualties especially those who like free coins and follow the airdrop are not obvious because many tasks must be completed including one visiting their website. How to check, I think there are many references that can be done, for example, check for security signs such as the "https" protocol and the padlock icon, and if it looks genuine and doubtful, make it a habit to look for reviews or additional information to strengthen the important thing, don't just click.

Is just like most of this exchange wallet we see in google play store most of those exchange app happens to be scam, most people after downloading such application they might decide to move some of their coin to the exchange app without knowing that is a fake application probably thier coin will be stocked inside the exchange wallet and that is final. That is why as a beginner is very good to ask questions, so as to know the right exchange wallet to use. However there are so many Ways to dictate fake website this are:

(1) you need to consider how you find the website in the first place.
(2) look for spelling grammar and formatting issues.
(3) use safe browsing tools or website checker.

This are few Ways in which you can dictate a fake website.

Scammers can always do everything just to make sure they steal what you have work, but you can stop yourself from being scammed, although scammers are very smart when it comes to getting your attention and making you communicate with them and make them access your account or wallet what you will do to prevent them is to be smart and stop yourself from any website or airdrop that are fake, I have seen many people got scam because of the fake website they get their selves involved, there are some fake websites and some links in that will be provided to you, don’t clink it because some links are very dangerous and immediately you clicked on the link they will get access to your wallet or account.

Many people also get scammed because of their greed, did you know that the best way for a scammer to scam you is to open a website and introduce you to the that when invest in their project you will make double it and that will make you feel like you should invest and gain more profit and at the end you will end up being scammed, newbie needs to know about all this because I know that they are the one that will get scam easily than anybody so let be clear every time you are in online.

Such things will happen, when you are new here or new to something you may fall into a trap because if you are not very experienced. The biggest mistake newbies make is when they see that there is more to be gained than just getting in here. When he steps into the hole, his foot does not return intact. The number of frauds is increasing so you need to be more careful, it is not possible to eradicate such cycles completely but we will not give them a chance. Instead of taking a hasty decision, always enter the platforms after analyzing the current future well.

I would like to add some suggestions to complement some of the points you have explained, get used to accessing the official link to install the application or the best advice is to just use the official website to use an exchange account.

Additional advice, always be careful about storing coins on exchanges with a low reputation because some exchanges have closed without notice, my friend has lost a lot of shiba coins in his exchange wallet because the exchange site has closed.

Investing in Bitcoin means buying Bitcoin from some centralized exchange. In this case we should always buy from trusted and verified exchange. But we can take help from CoinMarketCap, Coingecko to verify if the exchange website is real or not.  Because there is always a real website link here.

I am simply giving examples of users here. When a YouTuber makes a video praising a particular product, we trust that product and otherwise buy that product. Otherwise, when we don't get the service that the YouTuber said we get after purchasing the product, we blame the YouTuber and say that he made a bad product video for money. But we do not think that we did not sell the product from the site where the YouTuber asked to buy the product. 

Many times it is seen that some fraudsters upload the videos of those YouTubers on their page, making people think that their page is authentic. The real idiots here are the people who buy those products just by watching the videos without checking. 

Similarly, in the case of hiring a new project, if only someone else has invested, I will also invest in this reliability, then we will definitely lose our money. So we should always beware of such frauds and always take our decisions carefully

Not all exchanges listed on cmc and coingecko are reputable, they are indeed real website but the chance of your funds getting locked in is higher than using those exchanges that can be seen on their top 20 exchanges based on volume. Always google the exchanges' review, either on reddit and here (bitcointalk) and other community forums, ignore those review sites since most of them are paid.

Well we can count coingecko and CoinMarketCap as part of research maybe not a solid one...  even a reputable exchange can still be having the issue of getting  accused for stolen fund although most are due to negligence, it will be so hard to come to conclusion just have you've said  extensive researchis required.
There can also be a rest of mind to choosing a non custodial wallet over an exchange  wallet Although that also need research but there are reputable ones like Blue, sparrow and Electrum exchange ge could be done on sites like https://exch.cx/ since they might not support auto inexchange (swap)like exchange wallets

Scammers are always creating and cloning sites so they can use it to deceive newbies and steal from them. This is one of the reasons why we have to be very careful about logging in to sites we are never sure about. Scammers have been strategizing and looking for ways and tactics to scam more victims.  This might not stop soon and taking precautions is something we need to take very seriously so that we don't mistakenly fall victim to what we never expect would happen to us. This is why it is good for us to always check every websites.

Let us know what is your best way how to do research that even using reputable exchanges could get you into trouble for stolen funds issue, you can't call it reputable if that's what they are doing.

Wallet is wallet, not an exchange, you can exchange of course on other non-kyc platform but that's their limit, most people uses exchange is to regular trading either it's spot, future, etc. You can't force someone to use non-custodial wallet instead and follow your way of doing exchange

Firstly made a change on when to well...
Don't make it sound delusional.... exchanges have been hitted with a lot of hacks , seeing an accusations of stollen funds while researching doesn't mean that exchange is completely a red tag although some are obvious not to mention.. maybe the word  reputable was too much on your side...

Never said exchange wallet aren't wallets good enough .. I use both and I raised the suggestion because we can all agree one comes with a better assurance interm of privacy and security of funds.. and that doesn't mean exchange wallets aren't secured too, there's been upgrade in security on both side over the years ... just that the way I see exchange wallet is through their word "Exchange"  easy exchange more likely for business type...

Hacks are inevitable, that's why i mentioned top exchanges (top 20 by volume) listed on cmc or coingecko should be the people's first choice, most exchanges on this list with hack issue can still operates and refunded their users, unlike those small ones.

Researching always give you  hint and knowledge on what are good and bad, accusations thread/post of "stolen funds" doesn't mean anything if it was resolved at the end which most reputable exchanges do, unless the exchange has a reputation of selective scamming, locking funds, worst cs, you name it, that's why the word "DYOR" has was made.

Top exchanges look to be better and safer than smaller exchanges, I agree but there is risk and probability that top exchanges can collapse.

FTX exchange is an example on how a Tier 1 exchange can collapse very quickly. Cases on top exchanges like FTX might appear in future, we need to be careful with our money and can not trust any exchange even it is top exchange, for safety of our money.

Reminder: do not keep your money in online accounts (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5421039.0)
Exchange graveyard (https://www.cryptowisser.com/exchange-graveyard/)

Fake websites or sometimes phishing websites are pretty much common way of scamming investors. Newbies are the ones that are very prone to this because they aren't knowledgeable enough with regards to cryptocurrency. If only they are making research first before investing, then they might not get scammed or will fall to these phishing scams.

I admit that I also fell to these scams but that was when I was still a newbie and I know the things that I will do in order for me not to fall into these types of scam attempt.

- Going to Coingecko or Coinmarketcap would be a good option because they will not post phishing websites when you visit the project (at least that's what I have experienced). Whenever I look at a new project, I always go to either one of these websites and get their website there. At least getting it there will lessen the chances of you going to a fake website.
- After going to their "REAL" website and if you want to get updated into it, try to bookmark it. In this way, it lessens your chances of going to a phishing website because you already put the real website on bookmark. You will notice immediately if you are in a fake website or not.