Bitcoin Forum

when i copy paste my bitcoin wallet address i get this address
18v8Uqjt9wvEXXGbDCh9bLk15qXkFGeYmX
i have tried different address but result is same. any help

You have malware installed on your computer.

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/cryptoshuffler-stole-150-000-by-replacing-bitcoin-wallet-ids-in-pc-clipboards/
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/clipboard-hijacker-malware-monitors-23-million-bitcoin-addresses/
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/clipboard-hijacker-targeting-bitcoin-and-ethereum-users-infects-over-300-0000-pcs/

Scan your PC and remove the malware or a more better solution is to format your PC and reinstall OS. I would also recommend you to use VM for browsing, It would help your main system from not getting infected the next time.

Sweep your wallet to a new address that was never used before on your PC, as there's a small chance that there is other malware lying around on your computer and probably got a glimpse of your wallets.

Scan and format the hard drive if necessary, use GNU/Linux, be careful when you're online. Don't download random files and always verify files from the internet. Make sure not to send or interact with any crypto wallet before you solve this.

Easy $5,000CAD for the hacker in that address, really wish we blacklisted these coins and hacked exchange coins but then that would be kinda centralized, still it would be a nice fuck you to the scammers. I rather the coins be burnt then have them cash out. You can see some of the big exchange hacked coins being move around and sold, if It was up to me I would freeze that shit. Perhaps in the future a direct digital democracy and voting council of 51% of the people using the network can do such things, perhaps even revert stolen funds back would be nice and apprehend the fucking scum bag and serve justice on their ass.

So many lives have been ruined because of assholes like this. Just because it does not seem like it is money, you are stealing honest working peoples hard earned money, scam the fucking politicians and the bankers, not the general public, be like robinhood if your going to black hat.

Anyways I hope anyone who stole someones bitcoins in the future has double stolen from them or you become the person you stole from and see it from their side, dipshits.

I will suggest to do this and if I was you then I would do that. Just format and reinstall your OS, this is the safest way. This way, you will get a clean system. Don't risk your money for some tiny mistake.

By the way, before to remove everything from your PC, make sure you have a backup of the wallet.dat file or you have the seeds written and safe somewhere or you will lose your wallet and the money of course.

Just format your computer. I'm personally not comfortable using a device that has been infected even in the past. Format it instead to be sure, as we're talking about hard earned money that could potentially be stolen here. Good thing you double checked before sending. Some people with infected devices are unfortunate and didn't notice the address change.

Luckily you've managed to detect it before it harms you and your funds the first thing to do is to download a malwarebyte and subscribe to their premium service and if you don't have any money or funds right now you can subscribe to their 2 weeks trial but I would highly suggest to subscribe their services it's for your security.

Also reformatting your computer would do help as well so it's your choice.

You have lucky to know this before transfer any amount to a hacker account
Do a backup and format your computer, as soon as you can and most important, try to remember what you did to get this virus or malware to not get this again

Good that you have noticed it.

If you have another laptop or PC use it if you are about to send bitcoin to another wallet. Likewise, I would advise you too to format your PC that has been affected by that malware.

Always be vigilant before sending.

Can you still remember the apps that you have downloaded? it might came from those.

k00l1, you did not write what wallet you use, but if you have backup then most safest way would be to restore your wallet in some clean device. After that do what many other users suggested you, format that hard drive partition and install fresh OS.

After that do not make same mistake and leave your PC unsecured, fact that you get this malware is saying that you do not have any protection (Antivirus / Antimalware) or you have some very bad protection.

This is one of the easiest ways to lose your btc because people usually just copy and paste the address without double checking that everything matches correctly.  In the future you need to be more careful about what you download and what websites you visit to avoid malware and viruses. 

I use old laptop bought for just $40 (2.2 Core2Duo, 2GB RAM) with unique Internet connection (Via internet Dongle) and genuine windows OS, for all online transactions like Paypal, bank, Bitcoins... I don't use any anti-virus software tool. Didn't face for any security issue for last 7 years. Most importantly, I'm the only person who uses the laptop.   

If possible you need to backup your files, clean it then transfer it to another pc. Format the previous pc to make sure that it is totally clean. I think it is malware that you've got. Be careful next time. Please secure your wallet and make sure that it is really clean before you transfer it again on your previous pc.

In your situation my recommendation would be to boot from a secure linux media, a thumbdrive or dvd with a live distro such as (*)Tails (https://tails.boum.org/). There install the wallet and recover it with your seed words. Then create a new wallet, write down those new seed words, and transfer all funds to it.

Turn off the pc and do whatever it is you want to do to fix your computer, such as malware scanning, or just wipe it all like others suggest. In the future, it would do you very good if you used a better OS in the first place, but even if you do having a live iso at hand is always a must.

Please people, stop ignoring these basic security steps. Don't do your money stuff with the same OS you use for pleasure. Even if you do run something decent like Linux as your daily desktop, booting from a live image would ensure no surprises. Especially important when handling (cold) paper wallets.

* The reason i tend to recommend Tails (https://tails.boum.org/) is because it comes configured to use Tor by default, of course you can do the same with any other distro.

Get Malwarebytes installed on your machine and let it do the trick. You obviously have some malware installed in your PC hijacking your clipboard and changing it to something else. After using the said software in your computer and after the threat has been removed, run a deep scan or if you're still hesitant about the status of your PC, backup your files and reformat it immediately.

Try not to download any of them suspicious links and visit any other malicious websites as well.

Wow, whoever thought of this is pretty genius, most people would not have know that it was a different address. I always make sure to check the first 3 chars and last 3 chars of my address (usually just to avoid mistakes) but I guess it's for safety as well. Honestly you can never be too careful with this stuff, at least it wasn't an outright trojan that stole your coins.

That means your device has malware or you are copying it through a fake site. Usually if you copy through the site, they insert javascript that can change everything that is copied into their bitcoin address.

My advice is that you better use another device that is much safer, and make sure all the private keys in your old device are moved. Maybe you can use one of the applications here https://enterprise.comodo.com/blog/top-five-best-malware-removal-tools/

thank you everyone for the guidance and advice. removed the malware  from PC with Malwarebytes. Did clean install for windows on my PC

and when copying and pasting any wallet address i will type first or last letter myself so if i have any malware it cannot change it

I don't suggest typing manually because you could potentially make typographical errors and could end you up losing your bitcoin anyway. Just make sure to doublecheck everything, just like how you did recently. Keep it up.

Also, as always, grab a hardware wallet if you hold big amounts of bitcoin.

Am hoping OP has a partitioned hard drive at the least to save any  valuable data but for an alternative solution before you proceed with formatting try malwarebytes to disinfect your computer system. Even the trail version should work.

In addition to the normal back ups of important files and documents, I create a full disk image approximately every 6 months, and then encrypt that and store it on an external drive. I've never had to use it, but my logic is that should I suffer a complete drive failure or some horrendous malware which I cannot clean, I can just format my hard drive and restore from image in an hour or two, and it's like nothing ever happened. I also have a "clean" image of my drive taken from just after I finished installing and configuring all my usual programs for the first time, before it ever touched the internet, which I can go back to if necessary.

Given just how customized everything on my computer is, I dread to think how long it would take to set up again from scratch if I did need to reformat and didn't have my drive image available.

You know what, what I do now is I'm remembering the first 2-3 characters (numbers and letters) and also the last part. It's okay to do this but don't manually input the whole address.

During those days that I'm totally noob knowing if I'm affected with copy-paste malware, I'm typing the whole address manually and it takes a long time for me to end because I'm checking it many times just to be sure. Well, I'm scared of malware during that time.

What needs to be emphasized is that hardware wallets are not imune on clipboard malware attacks, and because of that Ledger is add option to verify address on hardware wallet, so if it match to one displayed on Ledger Live / Electrum user can be sure coins will be delivered / send to to the correct address.

Presumption that hardware wallet is something that can protect users form every threat is wrong, users lost coins even from hardware wallets every day, but not because of any vulnerabilities and hacking, but because they do stupid things (entering seed on fake sites, reseting device without seed backup, sharing seed with friends...).

No wallet will be immune to clipboard malware attacks. Even an air gapped wallet won't be immune, since you are generating the transaction on a live machine before transferring it your air gapped machine for signing, so if your live machine is infected then you are still at risk. The point of the hardware wallet is it forces the users to make a second confirmation of the address after hitting "send" in their wallet. If the user chooses to skip that and just confirm it without checking, then no amount of hardware or software engineering can prevent that.

You are absolutely right, but if our metric for whether a device or system is secure is whether the user does something stupid with it, then every security system in the world is at risk.

I also suggest that you should update your operating system (OS). Having an anti-virus installed on your computer is good but it doesn't mean that it can removed all potential malware hidden in your computer, I already compared some anti-virus programs and use it to scan but the results are different where the first anti-virus result is clean but the second anti-virus detects a virus that the first anti-virus didn't detect. About copying your wallet address and pasting another wallet address is called Clipboard Hijacking Attack which will replaced the wallet address you have copied to another wallet address that they have setup that when you paste the wallet address you pasted will be the wallet address of the person who infect you with the malware.

You have put something in your computer, it may have lurked somewhere. What you need to do is scan your computer, find malware and handle it. We need to pay close attention to and limit downloading of unknown applications to our computer. This will cause the data in our computers to be lost.

I just discovered yesterday that my laptop has been affected with this malware when i was trying to send some altcoins to my binance wallet, im so glad i cross checked the address or else i would have lost my coins

Please is there anyone that has a lasting solution that doesn't involve me formating mt PC, i would like to hear it because i have a lot of important data on my PC and i can't back it up at the moment