Challenge or Scam or Nothing?

[andreyxor]

The challenge began in April:
https://github.com/phrutis/wif500

Before that, on February 15, the case was raised here:
https://github.com/phrutis/Fialka/issues/21

And this case on January 29:
https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/112131/bitcoin-base-58-wif-format-private-key-recovery-front-5-character-are-missing

It's quite clear that there is a contradiction between these cases.

[pooya87]

It's hard to say what this really is.
I've seen others claim to own this address like this one claiming only 5 characters is missing which would have taken less than a minute to recover.
This means there could be a possibility that someone has been selling a fake "damaged key" on the internet and best case scenario is that creator of this repository has fallen for the scam.

The other red flag is that there is no source code to see. You will have to blindly run a binary not knowing what it does. Which again means best case scenario you waste your time and worse case is that you infect your system!
The other problem that I see is that the creator is basically asking you to do all the work while only getting a small share of the possible prize (assuming it is real)!

[AGD]

It´s pretty simple:
They say there is a privkey with 500BTC and when you find this privkey you´ll get 100BTC as a price.

What would really happen, when you find a privkey with 500BTC? You take the 500 bucks, right.

[NeuroticFish]

The cpp file posted is not the source code. So you'd run a random executable from the internet on your computer.

There's a chance that exe will install to you all the malware in the world.
There's a chance that exe will, if you find the key, send it to the one creating the program without ever telling you that you've hit gold.

I don't know why would anybody take chances with it, really.

[PX-Z]

What would really happen, when you find a privkey with 500BTC? You take the 500 bucks, right.

Of course, why would you tell the owner if you can get whole 500 than just 100.

But the thing is you need to use the .exe file from him to generate the remaining characters which is a red flag,  99.99% chance it could be a crypto wallet stealing malware.

[ABCbits]

I wouldn't bother with such challenge when they don't respect GPLv3 which used by WifSolverCuda[1]. Besides, it's more sensible to rent GPU on remote server or ask professional instead which have lots of GPU.

Why is the program without source codes?
The correct ranges and other parameters are sewn into the WifSolverCuda program.
Knowing them, the user can find the key on his own and take everything for himself.

[1] https://github.com/PawelGorny/WifSolverCuda/blob/main/LICENSE

[zasad@]

What worries me the most is that this is andreyxor's first post. Perhaps this is a trap. I would first rent or buy a mining farm, because it's a lot of money.
Ethereum private key is not real
9a26ab17c73e236820419c59d5822b66554e7d74a665c141dee65ay5c62df0ab

__
Posts in this thread have been deleted.
https://loyce.club/archive/topics/539/5394745.html

https://i.ibb.co/GRygWnV/wif500.jpg

Correct private key
9a26ab17c73e236820419c59d5822b66554e7d74a665c141dee65a95c62df0ab

[Seraphimjm]

I wouldn't bother with such challenge when they don't respect GPLv3 which used by WifSolverCuda[1]. Besides, it's more sensible to rent GPU on remote server or ask professional instead which have lots of GPU.

Why is the program without source codes?
The correct ranges and other parameters are sewn into the WifSolverCuda program.
Knowing them, the user can find the key on his own and take everything for himself.

[1] https://github.com/PawelGorny/WifSolverCuda/blob/main/LICENSE

you're smart,  its a modded version of WifSolverCuda with closed source to hide the segments and to hide whatever else was added to hide/encrypt the key if found.

What worries me the most is that this is andreyxor's first post. Perhaps this is a trap. I would first rent or buy a mining farm, because it's a lot of money.
Ethereum private key is not real
9a26ab17c73e236820419c59d5822b66554e7d74a665c141dee65ay5c62df0ab

__
Posts in this thread have been deleted.
https://loyce.club/archive/topics/539/5394745.html

https://i.ibb.co/GRygWnV/wif500.jpg

Correct private key
9a26ab17c73e236820419c59d5822b66554e7d74a665c141dee65a95c62df0ab

The original author has some messed up hand writing.

Also, if you check the tx the dates do not appear to match to the period of the damaged address

[Bitcoin.PN]

It's hard to say what this really is.
I've seen others claim to own this address like this one claiming only 5 characters is missing which would have taken less than a minute to recover.
This means there could be a possibility that someone has been selling a fake "damaged key" on the internet and best case scenario is that creator of this repository has fallen for the scam.

The other red flag is that there is no source code to see. You will have to blindly run a binary not knowing what it does. Which again means best case scenario you waste your time and worse case is that you infect your system!
The other problem that I see is that the creator is basically asking you to do all the work while only getting a small share of the possible prize (assuming it is real)!

Yeah, but you can always disassemble the .exe to see what it does. So, it could be NOT a scam, but it makes it fishy that OP created a new account just to post that that url is a scam lol

[Bitcoin.PN]

It's hard to say what this really is.
I've seen others claim to own this address like this one claiming only 5 characters is missing which would have taken less than a minute to recover.
This means there could be a possibility that someone has been selling a fake "damaged key" on the internet and best case scenario is that creator of this repository has fallen for the scam.

The other red flag is that there is no source code to see. You will have to blindly run a binary not knowing what it does. Which again means best case scenario you waste your time and worse case is that you infect your system!
The other problem that I see is that the creator is basically asking you to do all the work while only getting a small share of the possible prize (assuming it is real)!

Yeah, but you can always disassemble the .exe to see what it does. So, it could be NOT a scam, but it makes it fishy that OP created a new account just to post that that url is a scam lol

Forgot to say that the OP created that GitHUb April 13th or so it seems. Link: https://archive.vn/LEUwf

[andreyxor]

The first post was edited on 18 April
After a few days of searching, I'm sure this challenge could not be true.

[freeweekend]

Does anyone know about explicitcoininvestment . com ?
Is this a fraud?

[TheNineClub]

The challenge began in April:
https://github.com/phrutis/wif500

Before that, on February 15, the case was raised here:
https://github.com/phrutis/Fialka/issues/21

And this case on January 29:
https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/112131/bitcoin-base-58-wif-format-private-key-recovery-front-5-character-are-missing

It's quite clear that there is a contradiction between these cases.

Whenever in doubt, better safe than sorry. Maybe it's legit, maybe not, either way, there is no free lunch out there, and if something looks suspicious, maybe best to treat it like that.

Does anyone know about explicitcoininvestment . com ?
Is this a fraud?

If you have any doubts about scams and frauds regarding crypto, please check the scams & accusations subforum and there you can search and ask for more details. Also, people update that section regularly so if you don't get a desired answer right away, maybe something pops up soon.

[Trancefan]

I want to say that this so called challenge is a scam. If the owner of the address is only missing the first 5 characters of the BTC WIF, then he won't be asking for help because 58^5 is 656,356,768 and WIFSolverCuda can find it in no time. I wouldn't waste my time on the challenge.