Imposter Warning for Newbies! (thank you)

[OgNasty]

!!! WARNING: This user is a newbie. If you are expecting a message from a more veteran member, then this is an imposter !!!

I just wanted to say thank you for whoever put in this warning when getting PMs from newbies.  I've noticed an uptick in people trying to scam those accepting my escrow services by impersonating me and asking for BTC.  I believe this warning will stop those scammers dead in their tracks, and I just wanted to say thank you to whoever is responsible. 

I'll admit I have been a bit frustrated in the past by the lack of moderation when it comes to scammers, but this really is a great feature that I think will save people from losing their coins.  Thanks!

[bitcoin_bagholder]

Agreed, great feature for the forum.

There is no joy in mudville over this for the bitcointalk scammers.

[Mt. Gox]

!!! WARNING: This user is a newbie. If you are expecting a message from a more veteran member, then this is an imposter !!!

I just wanted to say thank you for whoever put in this warning when getting PMs from newbies.  I've noticed an uptick in people trying to scam those accepting my escrow services by impersonating me and asking for BTC.  I believe this warning will stop those scammers dead in their tracks, and I just wanted to say thank you to whoever is responsible. 

I'll admit I have been a bit frustrated in the past by the lack of moderation when it comes to scammers, but this really is a great feature that I think will save people from losing their coins.  Thanks!

It was actually done 5 days ago by theymos. You can find the official thread with the announcement here:

http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1043941

Moderation doesn't spend too much time dealing with scammers because there is too much of them and recognizing scammers and policing the forums for likely scams isn't as straightforward as it sounds. Most people who have been on the forums for long enough will probably make sure to double check the username to see if it's the actual person who they're speaking with but sadly, sometimes this doesn't always happen.

Example:

How did he scam assets out of you?

He created accounts with names that were almost identical to names on the stakeholderlist.

So there would be dudexxx on the list and he would create an account dudexx.

I always check on the google spreadsheet with the search function if the PMs really came from stakeholders. If the search function finds the text you are looking for it marks the entire cell green not just the letters which is why i didn't notize the one missing character. Cell lit up green so I thought it was a match...

Link: http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=677064.msg7673786#msg7673786

[Astargath]

Thats definitely a really good feature however i never understood the lack of scam moderation either. In the scam section there are plenty of accusations that are already shown to be true beyond reasonable doubt and the scammer accused is still in the forum, yeah he might have red trust, but why isnt he banned? And before you say things like, its hard, it wont help banning him, what about the other bans that are happening, the sig campaign bans for useless posts, how come they have time to moderate that?

[Lorenzo]

Thats definitely a really good feature however i never understood the lack of scam moderation either. In the scam section there are plenty of accusations that are already shown to be true beyond reasonable doubt and the scammer accused is still in the forum, yeah he might have red trust, but why isnt he banned? And before you say things like, its hard, it wont help banning him, what about the other bans that are happening, the sig campaign bans for useless posts, how come they have time to moderate that?

If moderators/administrators assumed the responsibility of identifying scammers, then it's quite possible that the community might become more lax and less vigilant about identifying scammers and all of the bannings could potentially create a false sense of security. Those scammers who do pass the staff's checks would then be able to cause even more damage when their ponzi/dice site/exchange/whatever shuts down. Hence the trust system is there so that we can see make our own judgements as to whether or not something is likely to be a scam. Once an account has deep red trust, there is no way that anyone is going to trust them for any further trades so banning them would be unnecessary.

Also, there is a question of who should be banned as well. I won't say any names but there have been people who made a mistake and blew their investors' funds, but later came back and admitted to their mistake and are now active members of the community. Then there are cases like Inputs.io and Mt. Gox where it's not clear what exactly happened. Were they scams? We can't really know for certain.

For a normal forum, it would probably make sense for moderators/administrators to identify and remove likely and confirmed scams. For a community such as this one where a large percentage of all services end up being scams and new ones pop up daily (check out the investor-based games subforum for examples), it would just be too much work.

[Astargath]

Thats definitely a really good feature however i never understood the lack of scam moderation either. In the scam section there are plenty of accusations that are already shown to be true beyond reasonable doubt and the scammer accused is still in the forum, yeah he might have red trust, but why isnt he banned? And before you say things like, its hard, it wont help banning him, what about the other bans that are happening, the sig campaign bans for useless posts, how come they have time to moderate that?

If moderators/administrators assumed the responsibility of identifying scammers, then it's quite possible that the community might become more lax and less vigilant about identifying scammers and all of the bannings could potentially create a false sense of security. Those scammers who do pass the staff's checks would then be able to cause even more damage when their ponzi/dice site/exchange/whatever shuts down. Hence the trust system is there so that we can see make our own judgements as to whether or not something is likely to be a scam. Once an account has deep red trust, there is no way that anyone is going to trust them for any further trades so banning them would be unnecessary.

Also, there is a question of who should be banned as well. I won't say any names but there have been people who made a mistake and blew their investors' funds, but later came back and admitted to their mistake and are now active members of the community. Then there are cases like Inputs.io and Mt. Gox where it's not clear what exactly happened. Were they scams? We can't really know for certain.

For a normal forum, it would probably make sense for moderators/administrators to identify and remove likely and confirmed scams. For a community such as this one where a large percentage of all services end up being scams and new ones pop up daily (check out the investor-based games subforum for examples), it would just be too much work.

So the excuse: ''It would be too much work'' is a valid one? Then you could say that for anything and let every thief escape because it would be too hard to catch all of them so we let all escape. Is not that admins or mods have to assume the responsibility of anything, they only have to ban those scammers that are already confirmed, they dont have to do anything if there are proofs of their scam, thats why i said beyond reasonable doubt. I dont know if you follow me here

[Muhammed Zakir]

So the excuse: ''It would be too much work'' is a valid one? Then you could say that for anything and let every thief escape because it would be too hard to catch all of them so we let all escape. Is not that admins or mods have to assume the responsibility of anything, they only have to ban those scammers that are already confirmed, they dont have to do anything if there are proofs of their scam, thats why i said beyond reasonable doubt. I dont know if you follow me here

Nope. The excuse is "it is impossible if you want to be fair and just"

[Astargath]

So the excuse: ''It would be too much work'' is a valid one? Then you could say that for anything and let every thief escape because it would be too hard to catch all of them so we let all escape. Is not that admins or mods have to assume the responsibility of anything, they only have to ban those scammers that are already confirmed, they dont have to do anything if there are proofs of their scam, thats why i said beyond reasonable doubt. I dont know if you follow me here

Nope. The excuse is "it is impossible if you want to be fair and just"

How can you be fair and just then? In your opinion? Isnt that how real life works? we have a jury wich is a person who decides if it was right or wrong and if the proofs or evidence was enough, why wont that work here? I still dont get it

[hilariousandco]

So the excuse: ''It would be too much work'' is a valid one? Then you could say that for anything and let every thief escape because it would be too hard to catch all of them so we let all escape. Is not that admins or mods have to assume the responsibility of anything, they only have to ban those scammers that are already confirmed, they dont have to do anything if there are proofs of their scam, thats why i said beyond reasonable doubt. I dont know if you follow me here

Nope. The excuse is "it is impossible if you want to be fair and just"

How can you be fair and just then? In your opinion? Isnt that how real life works? we have a jury wich is a person who decides if it was right or wrong and if the proofs or evidence was enough, why wont that work here? I still dont get it

But this forum doesn't want or have the time to be a judge and jury on scammers, that's up to the community to police. Staff have enough to deal with just on the day-to-day running of the site and cleaning it up rather than adding dealing with scammers into the mix which would increase workload tenfold.

[ACCTseller]

The difference between this change and the forum banning scammers is that this change generally will prevent scams from happening in the first place while banning scams would force the forum to make determinations that it is really not equipped to make.

[boxkite]

The difference []

Any reason you're not posting these pearls of wisdom from your main account? Other than farming this alt?

[hilariousandco]

The difference []

Any reason you're not posting these pearls of wisdom from your main account? Other than farming this alt?

Any reason you're not posting them from yours? I really don't know what you're trying to achieve here other than trolling.

[boxkite]

The difference []

Any reason you're not posting these pearls of wisdom from your main account? Other than farming this alt?

Any reason you're not posting them from yours? I really don't know what you're trying to achieve here other than trolling.

This is my main account. Not the case with ACCTseller. I know that to be true because Quickseller has admitted to it.

If you have further questions, don't hesitate to ask.

[hilariousandco]

We all know that's not true. And I don't ever think it was a secret that that account belonged to him (not that there is anything wrong with that either).

[boxkite]

We all know that's not true. And I don't ever think it was a secret that that account belonged to him (not that there is anything wrong with that either).

You sound exactly like Quickseller. "We all know"
Unless you're pompous enough to use royal plural, "we" know no such thing.
Quickseller did try to keep his ACCTSeller alt a secret, until he was cornered, like a rat, by another scammer. At which point he owned it, and hence my question re. why he isn't posting from his main account.**Using "main account" in the broad sense. Quickseller is yet to disclose his original Bitcointalk account, so I wouldn't know if he posts from it

[marcotheminer]

Oh boy, here we go again.

[hilariousandco]

We all know that's not true. And I don't ever think it was a secret that that account belonged to him (not that there is anything wrong with that either).

You sound exactly like Quickseller. "We all know"
Unless you're pompous enough to use royal plural, "we" know no such thing.
Quickseller did try to keep his ACCTSeller alt a secret, until he was cornered, like a rat, by another scammer. At which point he owned it, and hence my question re. why he isn't posting from his main account.**Using "main account" in the broad sense. Quickseller is yet to disclose his original Bitcointalk account, so I wouldn't know if he posts from it

I am Quickseller's original account  . 'We' as in everybody. And no, it wasn't a secret, you just didn't know about it and he was playing with the guy who wasn't sure.

[Quickseller]

We all know that's not true. And I don't ever think it was a secret that that account belonged to him (not that there is anything wrong with that either).

You sound exactly like Quickseller. "We all know"
Unless you're pompous enough to use royal plural, "we" know no such thing.
Quickseller did try to keep his ACCTSeller alt a secret, until he was cornered, like a rat, by another scammer. At which point he owned it, and hence my question re. why he isn't posting from his main account.**Using "main account" in the broad sense. Quickseller is yet to disclose his original Bitcointalk account, so I wouldn't know if he posts from it

I am Quickseller's original account  . 'We' as in everybody. And no, it wasn't a secret, you just didn't know about it and he was playing with the guy who wasn't sure.

lol what?

[boxkite]

[]
I am Quickseller's original account  . 'We' as in everybody. And no, it wasn't a secret, you just didn't know about it and he was playing with the guy who wasn't sure.

He was "playing"? Now that playtime's over, see my first post in this thread.
If by "we" you mean "everybody," then you're simply wrong: I, for one, do not. But nice tagteam trolling + bonus for earning a few satoshi with your posts.

Oh boy, here we go again.

I've failed to provide you with the elevated philosophical discourse you've grown so accustomed to here, on Bitcointalk?
So sue me

[Muhammed Zakir]

We all know that's not true. And I don't ever think it was a secret that that account belonged to him (not that there is anything wrong with that either).

You sound exactly like Quickseller. "We all know"
Unless you're pompous enough to use royal plural, "we" know no such thing.
Quickseller did try to keep his ACCTSeller alt a secret, until he was cornered, like a rat, by another scammer. At which point he owned it, and hence my question re. why he isn't posting from his main account.**Using "main account" in the broad sense. Quickseller is yet to disclose his original Bitcointalk account, so I wouldn't know if he posts from it

I am Quickseller's original account  . 'We' as in everybody. And no, it wasn't a secret, you just didn't know about it and he was playing with the guy who wasn't sure.

lol what?

QS is less active on days hilariousandco is more active. Looks like true.