REMINDER: Do NOT use "forum escrows" off-forum!

[nutildah]

It's called forum escrow for a reason!

Recently there has been a flood of currency exchange scams taking place on Telegram where users are contacted by someone impersonating a reputable Bitcointalk member, pretending to act as a neutral 3rd party escrow. These accounts almost always belong to a scammer who is most likely one of the two parties currently attempting to make the deal.

Therefore, you should never deal with a "forum escrow" without receiving a message from them on the forum first, confirming their off-forum contact details (email, telegram, etc).

 - Being contacted by an escrow by email first is a bad sign.
 - Being contacted by an escrow on Telegram first means you are definitely talking to a scammer!

Before making a deal, always PM the escrow you wish to use on the forum. Better yet, write a post in their escrow service thread and wait for them to respond in public.

Also, avoid making deals with newbies, especially if you yourself are a newbie. You will most likely get scammed.

But primarily, just don't make deals with "forum escrows" that are totally off-forum!

Have a record of the deal taking place either in a Bitcointalk PM or post. If you don't have this, it's much harder to help you if you have been scammed.

Thanks for your attention.

[TalkStar]

- Being contacted by an escrow by email first is a bad sign.
 - Being contacted by an escrow on Telegram first means you are definitely talking to a scammer!

Telegram related scam is increasing day by day and no way to deny that making deal with anyone through telegram being too much risky for newbies now. Most concerning thing is that these specific group of scammers have targeted trusted escrow providers now. After using the reputation of bitcointalk users for a long time now they are trying to make newbies fool by creating telegram account with trusted escrow service providers name but different username. Sometime newbies don't feel it necessary to contact real person through forum account and make the transaction.

Before making a deal, always PM the escrow you wish to use on the forum. Better yet, write a post in their escrow service thread and wait for them to respond in public.

Using forum PM system is the only way by which newbies can make hassle free and safer deals everytime. Sometime after making the post on escrow service thread scammers will start to give them PM from unknown/newly created forum account or telegram. I think its always better to send direct PM to escrow providers.

[nutildah]

A friendly bump of this topic as escrow scams continue to take place.

Never assume somebody you are dealing with on Telegram is the same person you are dealing with on the forum until after you receive confirmation on the forum. Better yet, just don't use Telegram to make escrow deals, or any deals at all, actually.

[philipma1957]

yes this was done using my name on discord and on telegram and on gmail

I only escrow via pm here on bitcointalk.

I only use philipma1957 legendary account.

also this always tends to happen when coins heat up.

be very careful.

my profile will show that i have over 32000 posts.

my start date is august 17 2012

please watch for your selves.

[nutildah]

yes this was done using my name on discord and on telegram and on gmail

I only escrow via pm here on bitcointalk.

I only use philipma1957 legendary account.

Thanks for clarifying. I was reminded of this thread when I saw you interacting with this guy. I think he is going to try to impersonate you on Telegram to conduct a mining equipment scam, so its good that you stated you only escrow through PM on Bitcointalk.

[rexxarofmoknathal]

Pretty sure a bunch of escrows on here operate a slack channel to manage their escrow deals. They set it up through the forum then finalize it on Slack.

I don't think it's a problem dealing with escrows off-forum, so long as the escrow unequivocally proves that they are in fact the person behind the alias on whichever other platform they're using to complete the deal, e.g. Telegram, Slack, Discord etc.