Bitcoin Forum

What happened:

I tried to use the mixer service at bitcoinmixer.info, but the amount didn't arrive at the destination address.  I used the contact form to file a question, and got a response from a gmail address.  In order to solve the issue automatically, it said, I should send additional BTC 0.1 to a given bitcoin address.  D'uh.  I never got the amount back.

Please be cautious if you decide to use this “service”!

Reference Link:

http://bitcoinmixer.info/

Amount Scammed:

BTC 0.15

Proof of Payment:

https://blockchain.info/tx/9a8eb1724b20a43bc081e7aff9b135d2853d2da43ad1ecafc946aeafeba53ce2

Email conversation:

When the amount hadn't arrived at the destination three days later, I sent a message through the contact form on the site:


And a day later I received this reply:


And my reply:


I never heard from the guy again.

Additional Notes:

The bitcoinmixer.info domain was registered just a little more than a month ago (unfortunately the WHOIS data is useless):


It doesn't seem any people here have any experience with this “service” yet.  However there's a recent thread started by a newbie that lists bitcoinmixer.info as its first link:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=712843.0

Don't ever trust any list which is made by some new member. I have seen same kind of fake list of exchange sites too, in which one guy lost 5 bitcoins.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=667814.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=637841.0

Yes, it certainly looks fishy to me.

Here are two screenshots that show bitcoinmixer.info in action.

The first is where you enter the destination address and amount to mix:

https://i.imgur.com/tKa8cHA.png (http://imgur.com/tKa8cHA)

The second clearly shows that the address presented in plain text is different from the one shown with QR-code:

https://i.imgur.com/nOG6YQO.png (http://imgur.com/nOG6YQO)

Link to album with the images side by side ⌘ https://imgur.com/a/XHkZa

Edit:

And a reference to the images and this thread, just in case:

• https://archive.today/0MwgP (https://archive.today/0MwgP)
• https://archive.today/wYxOH (https://archive.today/wYxOH)

Cheers,

Almost one and half month later I get this private message:


That's pathetic.

Bitcoin "mixing" is effectively a type of money laundering, so it's bad they took your money but when you play with fire...

I have replied that once I've received my 0.15 BTC — and not a moment before — I will consider what action(s) to take, if any.

I have declined the user's offer.

Probably coinciding with this, a user on IP 188.115.165.104 [188-115-165-104.broadband.tenet.odessa.ua] has attempted to reset my BitcoinTalk password.

Maybe contact sitevalley.com where the website is hosted and let them know there is a money laundering service in use there - it is illegal in most countries.

Thanks for the hint.

Money laundering may be illegal in most countries.  However, bitcoin mixing seem to be accepted by the community — even blockchain.info uses it.

Even more signs it's a poor scam attempt:
Based on the HTML source, it's obvious that the site is running wordpress, and the form where you submit your address is really a "feedback" form (lol).
https://i.imgur.com/TPHuAKZ.png

Did I mention the qr code for the address is a static image? :D
https://i.imgur.com/rM0YJC9.png

The "one time use address" is static and loaded with the page. Also, it will "wait" for your bitcoins indefinitely because there's no mechanism for it to notify your browser that the bitcoin has been received.

Could some pre-hypertext processing not put that in there dynamically? 

Thanks guys, grue and Vod.

The owner of the site has paid me back the initial 0.15 BTC and is now pleading me via PM to take down this thread and the images on imgur because they are — in his own words — “dishonoring [his] service”. He keeps repeating that it is not a scam and that the discrepancy between the shown bitcoin address and the QR-code “was a mistake”.  If that is so, he can explain himself in this thread as soon as his “karma” is high enough to let him post.

And I got 2 reports demanding this topic be removed. :-\

not sure if serious

I would still like an explanation why the “one-time-use address” differs from the one found in the QR-code. The address shown in the window right now is “18q7Z2AVrTaaJo4oyYy4GCLdoq6M2p3fy8” while the image (http://bitcoinmixer.info/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/okey30000.png) shows “13h5X2[…]vk4TQkr”:

https://i.imgur.com/Jd7mb5i.png

and dates back to September 12:


The owner of the site claimed that it was a mistake that I was shown 2 different addresses, but obviously he hasn't bothered fixing that mistake yet.

Cheers.

And even if I clear the cookies and start anew — or user another browser — I'm still offered the same bitcoin address.  How's that for a “one-time-use address”?

I recived this message today
::)

it's because you're looking at a (modified) feedback form. The owner was too lazy to create a fake mixer site from scratch so he took a standard wordpress feedback form and changed it up a bit. It's very obvious if you look at the source.

Yes, thanks, I was just trying to refute the “pre-hypertext processing” speculation.

I realize this topic is a bit old (i will also make a post under a new topic), but the exact same thing happened to me recently. I guess I should have looked here before using bitcoinmixer.info, but i did not, and in any case i still feel they should be stopped from continuing their scam.

I have tried contacting them directly, but as i have not yet had a reply or my bitcoins back, i will proceed to contact their hosting provider and anonymity service, to hopefully find out who is behind the page.

Should there be anyone else (having lost bitcoins on bitcoinmixer.info) interested in pursuing this i would be happy to hear from you.

I'm sorry for your loss — I hope those jerks get busted.

Thx. The loss itself is (as yours) not huge, but its more the principle that they should not keep stealing from nice people like us ;)

that sucks

I agree.