Why not save yourself the trouble?

[Hatchy]

So recently, I made a post where I asked on how I could store my seed phrase after I bought a hardware wallet. And got some good replys from people of this forum. last week, a friend of mine wanted to buy a hardware wallet, so he could also store his cryptocurrency asked me which one was the best, I told him that he could try the Ledger Nano X. He said it was too expensive and he didn't have enough money to buy one.

yesterday, I received a call from him telling me to come over of which I did. On getting to him, I found out that his wallet has been keylogged and most of his cryptocurrencies wiped. He was only left with just few shitty coins that had little or no value. He said that since he could not get a hard wallet, all his coins were kept in his hot wallet (trust wallet to be precise).
 
 How they did this was very simple, he received a message on Twitter asking him to click a link and get free 0.1btcof which he did and was redirected back to his telegram and then to his trust wallet.
Like was he so dump, how could he have fell for such crap. What was he thinking?

After he had logged in to his wallet he was asked to continue refreshing until he received his token of which he kept on doing. He then noticed that his balance kept on dropping till eventually he was left with no Trace of his coins. I tried going back to check the link but it was no longer there nor clickable.


Please, I want to stress on the importance of using a hardware wallet.
storing your cryptocurrency with hardware wallet, your private keys are stored offline away from threat of hacking or scam. Please for every newbies out there, Im pleading with you all, listen to good advice.

Hardware wallet is the most secure way to store your cryptocurrency and protect your assets. If you don't have enough money to get one, why not save up and later on get one for your self.
 I want you all to see this as a lesson and please don't make the same mistake as my friend did, there's no such thing as free btc. It's just a way to trick you and most people definitely will fall for such crap. I'm tired of hearing people Lossing assets to scams.
 
I would love to hear you opinion on this guy's Please I don't really know how to console my friend.

[Cantsay]

~~~
I would love to hear you opinion on this guy's Please I don't really know how to console my friend.

The first mistake your friend made was using Trust Wallet which is a closed-sourced wallet. He could have chosen an open-sourced wallet like Electrum, additionally, Electrum can also be used offline making it almost as secure as using a hardware wallet.

Secondly, I think greed got the better side of your friend, and he wasn't able to resist the link because it stated that he would receive free BTC. No one or service online or offline will give you free money online without you having to do anything and if they do promise you it's very likely to be a scam.

As I said earlier, not everyone is able to afford a hardware wallet so it's very important that they learn how to safeguard their software wallet and you should also note that the user of a wallet plays a very big role in securing their wallet.

[lovesmayfamilis]

A hardware wallet will not help your friend, as long as he believes in miracles and also does not stop being greedy and naive. It is useful for some people to first learn about what surfing is, safe surfing on the Internet, that no one will ever share their money, how to store their seed phrases, and above all, how not to use telegram or social networks in public and with their personalities. With scammers, you need to behave like a mirror.
I would not be surprised if, with the most secure wallet, but only by waving a dollar bill, your friend would tell his seed phrases, show his documents, and at the same time pay extra to the scammer.
For the second time today, I say that people benefit from the lessons from scammers; only in this way do they become smarter.

[hugeblack]

The main goal of hardware wallets is to generate and keep the private key offline, so if your friend is careless and will randomly click on links or download apps from an unknown source, even with hardware wallets they will lose their money.

Let him learn:

 - Nobody gives you free money or random gifts.
 - Do not click on a random link.
 - Do not download applications that you do not trust or of unknown origin.

If you buy a hardware wallet, make the device that you connect to it only be used to send currencies (a clean and open source operating system, or it was purchased legally and did not download random applications on it)

[The Sceptical Chymist]

The first mistake your friend made was using Trust Wallet which is a closed-sourced wallet.

I get your point about using opern-source software, and it's a good one but I think the only mistake OP's friend made was clicking on that link that should obviously been interpreted as a scam.  He probably wouldn't have lost anything had he been using a HW wallet, but if he'd had to type in his seed phrase for a Ledger for example, I assume the keylogger would have captured it as well.

Jesus, I don't know much about keyloggers even though I've heard about them for years.  I didn't think you could get infected with one just by clicking a link.  Is that true?  I'm not doubting OP's story, but wouldn't there be something that catches that stuff before it gets onto your computer?

[SFR10]

asked me which one was the best, I told him that he could try the Ledger Nano X.

A hardware wallet that introduces more problems on top of the existing ones is not the best option: Ledger Nano X Battery Circus ^{[don't forget to read "all" of the comments as well]}

storing your cryptocurrency with hardware wallet, your private keys are stored offline away from threat of hacking or scam.
~Snipped~
I would love to hear you opinion on this guy's

You have a point, but it still wouldn't stop your friend from storing the seed phrases in a reckless manner ^{[e.g. online or rather in a digital format]}!

there's no such thing as free btc.

You can get a "tiny fraction" of Bitcoin on faucets, but it's not worth the trouble.

Please I don't really know how to console my friend.

I'm not sure how much he lost, but considering that he couldn't afford to buy a hardware wallet, then it wasn't probably that significant, so tell your friend he should consider himself lucky for getting the wake-up call quite early in the process of accumulating cryptocurrencies and he should now take this moment to improve his knowledge about the basics of keeping his cryptocurrencies safe!