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As stated in the topic, what is the first thing that makes you raise the alarm?

Team is the most important thing. There should be at least one known and real person in the team.
Fake names, fake photos, fake titles are the first signs for me.

Honestly better to look for signs that an ICO is NOT a scam, than the reverse.  Good ICO's are like a needle in a haystack.

Usually the very fact that there is an ICO is enough for me to write a project off completely.  I will make exceptions only if they demonstrate clear innovation, and the ICO is done in a fair and transparent manner as well.  An example would be Komodo; you got a reasonable amount of coins in exchange, the ICO lasted several months, BTCD conversions are accepted for a full year which is still going, and they overall did a solid job of advertising for it.  Still not ideal, but I have enough respect for their team that I am willing to overlook it.  Another one is Bitbay, which stood at less than 1/3 of its relative bitcoin ICO price for the better part of 2 years with a market cap sitting at $100k-$300k USD, everyone had good opportunity to get in on that one early.

I will also say that devs using their real identities is generally a plus, but sometimes they scam anyway, and sometimes anonymous devs stick around longer.  @jl777 I feel I can take a chance on because he has been here for years, if he was going to cut and run he'd of done it by now;  @Smooth is another good example of that (though I believe he has shared his identity with other devs, but I don't remember well enough to be certain.)

Bunch of things,
 -> Self Moderated Threads + several bounty campaigns with a broken English speaking campaign manager.
 -> ICO appearing out of the blue moon with a non-newbie account with a team that is hired from bitcointalk.
 -> Cheap ICO page with a bought script and a bootstrap theme.
 -> Another POs shitcoin with no creative idea behind.

What is the product they are offering? Does using blockchain. Actually make sense?

Tons of icos use blockchain simply to raise millions.

Also, the team is very important. I'd they are known in the scene it is generally more likely that they will not scam you (remember, the project can still fail!)

For me first sign is that they want me to send some of my valuable well known established currency in return for some worthless token that they created out of thin air.

Teams which have shitty developers and hides their real identity are the ones which cannot be trusted. You might also see some aggressive advertisement/campaigns to promote their ICO and rewarding users with insane bounties. Failing to demonstrate their project properly and being able to not show how much they are going to succeed is another typical sign of shiity ICOs.

I don't think so ? I mean no one knows Satoshi/creator of bitcoin ? Doesn't make him a shitty developer right ? As long as the idea is right and the code is open-sourced with an active development team,identities doesn't really matter.ICO come along with their own risks anyway.

Yeah,the like I said,ICO which hire broken English speakers from bitcointalk to manage their bounty campaigns are the ones who clearly have no future.

Here are my red flags (no particular order):

-  Anonymous Team  ie.  FuckToken
Is anyone comfortable handing over money to someone they have never met, seen, or heard of before?

-  Inexperienced Teams
I prefer to see teams and developers that have been in their respective industries for years.  Startup and corporate experience are very important here too.  

-  Fake Profiles
Integrity is perhaps the most important trait for me personally.  Once that is betrayed, it can't be recovered.

-  No Prototype
Teams with no prototype give me a good indication of a team's ability to execute and gain traction.  It doesn't require much time to develop a proof-of-concept for any demo.  And quite frankly, every team should be required to prove that they can sweat and hustle (in a short period of time) before trying to raise millions on the open market.

-  One Person Companies
Self-explanatory

-  A large number of team members and advisors  
This scares me for multiple reasons.  First, I always laugh when a startup has no prototype but displays a large team of employees and advisors.  Additionally, teams can not be efficient at the startup stage with both.  Having a large team increases payroll and operating expense.  If a team doesn't have a product or prototype, a large team is not going to be efficient in the early stages of the company.  The same goes with having a lot of advisors as the leadership team will be pulled in many different directions.

-  Quick ICO Timeline
Everything that is worthwhile in this world takes time.  Companies that drum up an announcement, website, and try to ICO in short period of time are always questionable.

-  Questionable ICO Terms
If a team is raising an large amount of funds despite not having a product or vision to accompany the raise amount, that is always questionable.  Additionally, if the token distribution favors the founders versus the investors.

-  Solution vs. Problem
If a team isn't solving a problem with a large pain point across many people, it is likely to not have a lot of impact and potential.

-  No Clear Roadmap
A team should be able to articulate the results and direction for the company the last six and next six months, respectively.  If not, then they haven't done the necessary diligence to plan and succeed.

If they refuse to conduct an ICO through an escrow.

Well,there have been cases where ICO's scammed even they used forum's trusted escrows.Money never arrived on the escrow addresses after the 2 days of the ICO. Whatever they managed to raise in a day or two was wiped away.There have been ICO's which were successful without forum's escrow too and they did manage to raise a few millions to reach the goals.I could give you examples but I'm pretty sure you know their names.

Check the team. Most of the information comes from the team and you can easily recognize scam ICOs by analyzing each members of the team in order to find information about them. There are too many ICOs around and you have to check them carefully before making your decision

Agreed.  Escrows aren't a requirement for me either.

I'd actually like to hear more about startups using a paper wallet to accept funding in order to ensure security.

If the ico has a lesser updates and announcement for the people. And if the ico has a big target price but it only gives a small amount of bounty to us. I dont know i only believes in my instinct.

The first thing that makes me raise an alarm that an ICO is scam is when the idea is shit and not feasible at all. Also, sometimes the site they have, the ICO platform, is a sign if the project is scam or not. If the site hosting is very cheap, there are chances that the project is a scam. Lastly, if the ICO dev lacks public relation, it will later on result into a PR problem and might eventually scam people.

Being an ICO does not mean that it is a scam. I think the main thing to look at is if the project has attainable goals, and if they have competent developers to achieve those goals.

First sign ?

..it's an ICO

The first sign for me is its appearance on this forum by a Newbie. The second is somebody comes on here touting the wonderfulness of their particular project it's probably because they want and need money. If they didn't want need money than they would come out make an announcement close the thread immediately and leave it there like that but they don't do that they leave it open because they want people to beg for information they want people to ask questions and that creates new activity which then creates new money for them if they play their cards right.

Ask your self this...
1) Is there product realistic?
2) Do the Devs have a face?
3) Does the team check out? ( Linkden,Facebook,Twitter)
4) Do they have a road map?
5) Is the project active? Are they active on social media?

first:idea.i saw realy meaningless projects like dating.cryptocurrency and dating? why ?
second: is their roadmap realistic?
third:team and transparancy

check the progress
if the dev give no info or update in long time
than its sigh that the project is scam

First check their  escrow system. without escrow any project can easily scam a ICO. i never join any ICO that has no escrow.its the best way for detect a ICO that its real or fake. than the team member, future plan etc is the most important things that i followed. also their working progress is also a best source of know that its scam or real.

Actually it's hard to identify if the project is scam. They can pretend to have a very strong, responsive and friendly support. Has a transparency, white papers and road maps are realistic. But there is still only one thing left in this type of projects, it should be backed up by anyone who has a positive and big trust rating in the market that will serve as guarantor and escrow.

You are misinterpreting what I said.  I never said those who hide their identities are ne'er do well developers.  :)
I added "and" between the words, not  "is".

Uncapped ICO is the first sign of a (potential) scam project. :'(

Exactly. First thing you do is to check people involved. Best is if you know some from before. Not know know, but had heard of them and their previous projects.

OP asked question a bit strange. I would never enter any non opensource project unless would know people behind it are trustworthy and passionate about the project. So latter on there will be no signs since scams will not happen.  


Thing is there are now so many good projects, you must be a real idiot to give money to scammers.

Cool, you have listed almost all my red flags for a ICO project scam. I think the team and the idea are the most important factors to be a successful ICO project.

sure, team profile very important. since many ico coming and failed every moment.
and i seen Timeline is something that needed to pay attention.
when the announcement has short time period, it looks to fast collect money without long planning term.

Well Im just newbie here in forum as well as in the world of ICO. At first, when I am reading on ANN section as well as altcoin marketplace where ICO related threads are posted, I have this idea that "if its so good to be true"( Im reffering to such things like really high value as start up or very insane amount of bounties) then possibly it wont be real. I see some ICO that even on the first bump of their thread you will be suspicious already on the way how their project would work. I even see some that moves like HYIP promissing insane profits in exchange of early investment without detailed information who they really are. In this world where scam is all around all of us just need to be really cautious to avoid being a victim.

Yes, definitely. The team is the main thing IMHO. Second and also important things are escrow, project (am I need it or not? problem solving or not?)

at first time check their  escrow system. becouse without escrow many project can easily scam a ICO.so first think is you must be aware this. i never join any ICO that has no escrow.its the best way for detect a ICO that its real or fake. than the team member, future plan etc is the most important things that i followed. also their working progress is also a best source of know that its scam or real. >:( :D

the fact that it's an ico is enough. i don't need any other details. even if the people involved are honest it's shitty setup that'll provide a shitty experience for the majority.

I do not think I have a thing that tells me this is a scam, it is more about the whole picture, if the coin does not seem to solve any problem, if there is nothing to show for before the ICO, ridiculous bonuses, fake pictures, unrealistic goals, a complicated road map.

agree with team check advice first, then quantity of info about the project and timeline of development, then amount of funds needed (less Is better in my opinion), last how difficult is to contact team member or support in general

Posted From bitcointalk.org Android App

I'll list the signs that I look for:

-If the team consists of people from the same country.
-If the white paper prepared properly
-If the road map prepared well
-If they use a known escrow agency
-If the teammates' history is clear

I check each of these criteria.

Yeah, but how can you really tell if a photo is fake? 

Most new coins aren't anything new and shouldn't be purchased, and we all should know that by now.  And we all know damn well that's not going to stop people from buying them.  There's way too much money to be made speculating.  It's pretty safe to assume any new coin is scammy.  There are some good projects floating around, but new coins?  No way.

I guess you need toa check this ann and then read the white paper where you need to be wise and then something wrong it is probably a scam and also when the dev is not updating in the campaign obviously probably a big scam in that ico we cant probably determine it easily i guess.

For me the first sign is a project trying to raise money with no working product, an unknown or anonymous team and an unprofessional website and managers.

There are plain scams, but also "soft" or elaborate scams. One very easy thing to do is to gather some ''devs'', pay someone to do webdesign and to write a good WP, create some hype. One can set up multiple profiles in linkedIn and fake those profiles with random photos and copied info from real profiles. This would give a false impression of a professional network.

GitHub can also be defrauded, albeit it is more difficult because there is a timeline there. So time of activity in GitHub is a good indicator of real or fake expertise. No one would intentionally fake 5 years of expertise since ICOs are more recent. Only if they buy profiles, or if they are mediocre programmers but already with years of mediocre code shared in GitHub. Or if they hack it somehow.

Even more difficult to get is a scam that also cheats the devs allocated, it is never the intention of the "CEO" to develop anything, but he manages to get some guys with real curriculum promising them a good share of the ICO revenue. Being a programmer is not exactly a highly paid profession in average, so some people would be more than willing to lend their names in exchange for a good piece of the ico pie. This might be done even signing legal documents, etc, but the effect is only to protect those ad hoc hired devs. The community thinks singed contracts are evidence of good will and seriousness, even better for the scammers. One life-changer shot of getting some millions in a few months...

After this, it is not difficult to squander the money since there is no compromise on successfully developing shit, after all it is a startup.

Be aware of all these details and simply don't put any money should a red flag pops up.

The first thing that makes me raise the alarm if one ICO is scam or not is when an ICO is trying to raise too much money with just a little percent of tokens or coins for investors and bounty participants, having more than 50% of the tokens for the dev or team. Also, I think an ICO is scam when there are so many premined coins.

It having a crowdsale/ICO in the first place. We all came to this space for proof of work and that is the correct and fair way to issue out tokens

Cynical, much!

I think the for me the signs of ICO being scam is # 1 their payments is very good to be true, 2nd no one known that ico really paying like your friends or other colleges in this site didn't even know or encounter that site even paying.

asking for btc and having nothing to show ps a whitepaper doesnt count. remember when devs made things or released trials and asked for cash?

its so easy to steal with ico thats why they do it. give you a whitepaper and empty words and they get cash. icos will stop when all btc is bled from morons and only smart people with btc left that dont invest in icos.

then youll all cry that most btc is in hands of few. fact is idiots were robbed in scams because they were greedy thinking thwy could turn 10k into 10 million.

would you give the nigerian prince some cash? no.... well icos are your nigerian princes.

This topic is amazing for future scammers...

Well, First, check the profile of their team, because it's the easiest to know if their team profile is fake. Then what is the idea of the product? or their ico goal is realistic? That's all I can say

I think there is no way to distinguish between good ICO and ICO scams because they use a lot of advertising and set up a very good information about the future. They use this method to entice investors and then release to users the TOKEN no value. For me, if a good ICO project they will update a lot of good news about the project and try to develop with the investor in the future.

For me, the rule is very simple. If the price is lower than 50% of the ICO price, the project is a scam.

I have been considering doing some data mining to build a model to predict scam ICOs based on a number of features we can extract from their websites and BCT threads.   I would need to compile a list of scams versus non scams and then do some data gathering but building a classifier wouldn't be too hard (thank you Kaggle contests) using decision trees or other standard methods.

Anyways, my hypothesis is that coins which offer real high 'early investor' bonuses will be scams.  People do this to take advantage of greed as it causes people to jump right in without a chance for discussion or proper research.  If it is a legit project then they do not need to use this tactic.  While this is not always the case as there have been successful projects which did this my gut tells me scammers will do this.

Then there is the presence of shilling.  I am currently doing another project with Amazon reviews to detect shilling (and shillers) so may have to come back to this.  A product with actual mixed reviews will have a different distribution of ratings as a product with shilling where two disjoint clusters of review scores form.  Sentiment analysis methods can be used to assist with this, along with some semantic analysis.

Then we have poor spelling, quickly written up webpages, short whitepapers, unrealistic claims, no escrow etc.  BUT NOT ALWAYS.  For example some scams have escrow just to throw people off.

It is good to be back Bitcointalk..  Maybe its time to start calling out scams again to keep my peeps safe.

- Is the token website a single app page ? What is the tech used ? (Aka website builder, bootstrap theme ...) ? Is the website secure ? (Not ony meaning https there, but also from common security vulnerabilties)

- Are translations bounties well verified ? Or is it google translate ?

- Is the whitepaper a mashup of words or are there real technical aspects ?

- Are the devs participating to events or videos ? Or do we just have some photos without proof of the persons behind the project ?

But to me it all depends on what do you define scam? something that you cant make money of , or just something that will dippasear into abyss. Some times scam coin are the ones which pump hardest  :o

For me it is when obvious question is being asked and the team is not asking them, that is when I notice something is wrong, no matter how stupid the question is the team should be able to provide answers to the questions

I think that this would be great.  Or come up with a weighted analysis that allows the community to provide an overall ranking (score) for ICO's.

Seems like a lot of ICO's scams are giving a bad rep to those that are actually trying to help create real authentic solutions for this world.  Ultimately, this hurts the entire industry including the growth of cryptocurrency.  We need to collectively come together as a community to report and discourage scams as much as possible.  Otherwise, it cripples the growth of this industry and hurts all of us...  :-[

For me I consider if they pay high for bounty campaigns and also have a low minimum token price (most at time that's the trick many project use to get people buy plenty tokens and also use it to take the poor man's little money as he can also buy with the little amount of money he has)
And whether they pay high for refs system. As this will help them get more people.
I also consider the security and location as well.

The price on listing? Actually, this is not a very good indication. Most ICOs (even scams) get listed at a very good price. But if there is nothing backing the coin, the price is bound to crash eventually.

I agree with JJacob on this.

domain name whois protection

Is this a "How do I run a scam ICO without being spotted" kind of thread?

While I doubt it is, I don't want to give any con artist any ideas. If you want to protect yourself always try to think from the position of a scammer. You will always learn something new that way, and will eventually learn how to keep your funds growing.

As the saying is, when it's too good to be true, it's a scam but in ico I think its half meant.
We should site first the white paper if it's good and realistic and second its product and roadmap and of course the team if it's trustworthy.
However, we can't really know at first if an ico is a scam, we can just say " we're scammed" after the ico and until the campaign manager didn't give us our bounty. So better to trust our guts.

no one knows it and shitty reasons to buy

I think this is just an honest questions, besides scamming with icos must need a lot of money and intellectuals so i doubt any bigtime scammers could even lurk around this community in a long time. But i agree that we should just not divulge any ideas in a forum full of random people.

That might get a little messy as shillers would abuse the ranking system.  Even if you have people rank the 'rankers' fake accounts can be created to manipulate this process.  Bitcointalk trust scores may help but other precautions should be taken.  How can this be set up in a way which it cannot be manipulated?

For now though I am just going to have fun doing the data mining on my own based on whatever features I can extract from ICO websites.  Bitcointalk announcement threads would be a great source of data but I am unsure of their site scraping policy.  Need to check on that first.  I am currently compiling a list of ICOs and their urls from several ICO sites but I will eventually need to label which ones are scams.  Another thing to predict will be overall success - we can use market cap a certain period after launch but my main interest is in scam modeling.  I will get back to bitcointalk in a few days with the next steps.  Once preliminary results are in we can all try to identify further features to use in the data mining/machine learning process to create more sophisticated models. 

As for the idea that scammers will use threads like this to improve their technique the field of 'adversarial machine learning' comes to mind.  It can sometimes be a cat and mouse game - as they modify their approach we will need to continue to develop better detection strategies.  It is a valid concern though.  The model used to detect and classify attacks/scams should not necessarily be published, BUT detection and classification of scams/attacks does need to occur.

Most ICO's these days seems legit but most of them also failed to deliver what they have promise and somehow turn into scam eventually after getting investors funds.

To present abuse to the ranking, you make it weighted.  For example, having a prototype carries more weight in the ranking.

Honestly, if they have 0 code written or published I think it's a huge red flag. All of these ICOs try to get very professional websites, flashy graphics and things to make you think they're legit. They push exceptional marketing tactics while throwing around fancy words to confuse novice investors looking to make a buck. It's very apparent on announcement threads here - so many scams look so great on paper and people get sucked on based on presentation and not substance. It's really too bad.

They have lots of promises and their marketing strategy are more active than their roadmaps and developments. After the ICO there will be no more active updates. Then slowly fades.

I will avoid if there is no escrow. I feel that if the team is more likely to deliver their promise if they willing to receive funds from escrow in progressive payments against work delivered.

I see but...  what do you do after they show their identities?
Leave beside the thing that declared developer has no past background in this sphere..
Then? What happens then?

An ICO project can be done on a one click to be real. I'm a daily visitor od one sire where there is a calendar od all coming ICOs and there is all tge information about each. I was reading some and it was clear to me already that not all of them have the future. Well, on what thing I pay attention the first is the idea, many projects do not suggest something unique or their suggestions are a replica of some another project. In this point the design and advertising doesn't play a role. The idea is the main thing in such projects.

Are there any legitimate escrow companies out there?  I've seen individual escrows on this forum, but that seems more safe to use an official escrow company.

If you are refering to ICOs

Project details - Project with overly abstract content are not trustworthy at all.

Suspicious members -  when the member behave like they are from those pop-up sites that promote binary bots. chances you are getting in scam ICOs. Double check their linkedin profile and google everything deeper and deeper, sometimes a 'CEO' feature on some videos/article doesn't mean they are trustworthy enough....

Website design is important as well, but there is not much to say if links are dead chances they are not having even one proper administrator.

Others are pretty subjective and difficult to justify, but valid and passionate dev with a creative, feasible projects are what we need

Not at all. That is just Spoetnik being Spoetnik. He has no filter, but a lot of the things he says are true. I agree with him on this. I have seen too many people get burned by ICOs in the past. The only people who make out on ICOs are the "devs" and the very early adopters who are able to buy low and dump on the late adopter chumps. I will go a bit further and add that any ICO on YoBit is guaranteed to be a scam. Stay as far away from that exchange as possible.

First sign? This is hard to tell, because all you get is a whitepaper. I think you need to rely on the community, because DYOR only works if you are capable to understand all the tech details and know enough people in the scene who are legit. And even "legit" people might get cheated on or become cheaters.

It is very difficult to be aware of a fake project that deceives people, now, there are so many different ways that they deceive investors. Therefore, before investing in a project, they often look at its potential and its developers.

Do they have a functioning product?

I they're selling vapor, it's better to stay away.

Do they really need a token?

Many of these projects could work with bitcoin and litecoin, there is no good reason for them to have their own token.

It's not always a "scam" but you can make very bad investment if there is no cap, long period investing (1 month), tech already existed, blockchain is useless for this tech etc.

This problem is actually quite hard to spot
Sometimes it depends on the heart, the greed of the developers
Behind the ICO projects are the 'dev'
There are dozens, hundreds of ICO projects on a daily basis
Be smart to choose yourself a best project
ICO idea:
+ Application (learning, game, health, ...)
Business model?
ICO technology
+ On which platform? (Blockchain, Etherum, Wase, ..)
Traditional
+ WEDsite
+ Blog
+ Forum
+ Advertising
+ Facebok
+ Twitter
+ Github
+ Youtube
...
Time to open sale?
Initial ICO price?
What is the Token Number?
How much capital to call? (How many tokens are sold)
Market
+ Scale
+ Object
Long-term vision (5 years, 10 years, ...)
Development team (Who are they?)
TOKEN DISTRIBUTION
+ Dev (%)
+ Bouties (%)
+ Pulic sale (5)
...

In fact, ICOs project in 2017 or last year are can become to scam project, but the time they become to scammer still long. Because if try scam at now, they will miss opportunity make money with this type. Not have rules can helps them easy to PR and creating project, just need use some money from crowdsale, they can easy listing to exchange site and user will say they are really project ::)

The team, some are just joker, like 16 years old team member called himself experienced, and then the project itself, does it has a clear plan or just pie in the sky

I would add to it, which Platform is it based on, I would stay away of all project that are built on top of an existing blockchain but not built on top of top 5 crypto currencies. (e.g. Next platform thats not user friendly at all).

Victor

You mean that they would rather finish an ico, issue tokens, get listed on the exchange and only then scam than disappearing right after money is raised?

Just out of curiosity.... What are some examples of "next platform"?  Are you referring to something like Waves?  Thanks.

First sign is the letter I

Suspicion starts to form.

If then C comes right next to it I am on red alert.

An O after the C = 95% scam.

I am now looking for the word capped or limit - I spot it.

100% scam confirmed.

Question for all of you that consider every ICO to be a SCAM, how else would a company distribute their coins?  And don't say air drop, because no one is going to spend significant time and money on a project to give it away for free.

If they are to have an ICO

Widely advertised beforehand
Uncapped with long duration
If possible POW phase 50%
Road map with milestones/fund release intervals.

anything less is setting up to be an insider market making colluding scam project.

There should be a working product or as much as possible the project can be vision potentially. When we can vision it chances it can get successful plus the team should be onhand and easy to contact too. Be smart in choosing ICO.

As for me, if I decide to buy an ICO tokens after some deep research, I will always keep my eye on it latest news, join in the slack, follow the twitter and blog if they have, and I will try to see if the team is working hard or not.

I believed we now have plenty of HYIP Monitor sites, Why don't we form a similar concept an ICO Monitor/Analyzer sites? Expert on spotting ICO scammers should lead this ICO Monitor/Analyzer sites :D

The background of the team, but also the amount of market cap they have over a period of time, if their coin doesn't fluctuate in value I'm assuming not much is happening at all, and therefore it is usesess to accumulate said coin

So, I can see some people consider uncapped ICO's as a sign of scam and others that consider the capped ICOs as a sign of scam, is that correct?

I think that some projects might fail even if they are not scams. A scam is when someone writes a whitepaper and creates a website promising to develop something he has not the intention of actually building. We maybe won't know what the real scams are until some months or years from now.

The cap raised during the ICO cannot determine whether it is a scam or not, but maybe it can determine if the project is a good investment (considering it is not a scam) or not, because very large caps will probably devalue after listing on exchanges.

Probably the biggest sign of of a scam project is the use of fake names and profiles in the Team section.

If the team has a product under development (or already developed), uses their real names, provides transparency about their operation, and stuff like that, if their ICO is uncapped and people send hundreds of million of dollars, the company might become overvalued, but I don't think it automatically qualifies the project as a scam. If instead they have a capped ICO and sell out in seconds, for me it also doesn't make the project a certain scam.

It has the word "ICO" in it. Crazy huh?

And it's true.

I mean the next platform it is a project by itself, there is the Next coin do to stuff on the Next platform. it will switch to ardor soon. I would stay away from it for a long time. It is full of bugs

HYIP at least have to make a claim about how they generate high returns. People can analyze that and attack that.
With ICOs, even that is not necessary.