Is forum escrow still safe?

[idyu]

After the Quickseller story i wonder if its still safe or should i ask is there any sense to use forum escrow or not ?

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[unamis76]

There are many reputable escrow services on the forums. Just search for them on the Services section.

[jt byte]

QuickSeller recently got negative feedback, and recently defcon23 has ?? ? (1 negative feedback)
For others as far as i see all are good enough and you can deal.
Check the top5 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=855778.0 and others who are online pm them.

[OgNasty]

Use a trusted escrow.  Quickseller was barely a member for a year here, if that, before he started offering escrow services.  Do your homework and find a trusted escrow who has been operating for several years on these forums without any issues and you'll be fine.  You can start here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=303281.0

[TheGr33k]

I'm sure QS will hop in here whenever s/he's around and give a good explanation about why this thread is silly, but I'll go ahead and put my two-cents in as well.
Depending on what you mean by "safe", yes it is entirely safe because to my knowledge no deal that was escrow'd by QS or his alts was botched and no 3rd party was disappointed with the service.

Just because escrows have alts doesn't mean they're not trustworthy.

[u9y42]

After the Quickseller story i wonder if its still safe or should i ask is there any sense to use forum escrow or not ?

No system is perfect idyu; there will always be users taking advantage of whatever they can, whenever they can.

With that in mind, of course you should still use escrow, when the situation calls for it - it does add an extra layer of security, when the system is working well (which has been the case, for the most part), and there might be ways to help avoid some of the problems when it isn't, such as, for example, opening the whole process, as much as possible, to public scrutiny.

[qwk]

to my knowledge no deal that was escrow'd by QS or his alts was botched and no 3rd party was disappointed with the service.

Just because escrows have alts doesn't mean they're not trustworthy.

I couldn't agree more.
QS may have done something "bad", but it surely didn't result in a loss for anyone but himself.

[Internet Explorer]

I think Legendary Escrows are still safe.

[u9y42]

I think Legendary Escrows are still safe.

You really shouldn't trust someone merely based on his forum rank - accounts get bought and sold with some frequency around here, although higher ranks less frequently so.

By the way, it's way past time for you to update yourself... I recommend Firefox.

[FruitsBasket]

After the Quickseller story i wonder if its still safe or should i ask is there any sense to use forum escrow or not ?

An escrow is never a 100% safe, but some trusted escrow that is on the default trust, that will not scam for low amount trades, but if you want big transaction/exchange, then it is the best to do a meetup and not an online deal..

[Athertle]

Use a trusted escrow.

OgNasty isn't too bad of an escrow himself. But yeah, people like SebastianJu/OgNasty who have over an year of forum trading without any real issues are preferable as an escrow.

It's definitely still safe.

[TheGr33k]

I guess the simplest answer to your question would be "It's as safe as it's ever been", and if you think it was safe at one-point then it probably remains true to this day. Whenever you are trusting an unidentified 3rd party with your money, goods, account , etc. - you are risking losing it, every single time. You have been warned, but there are some old-friendly faces around here that have already been mentioned .

[poeEDgar]

QS may have done something "bad", but it surely didn't result in a loss for anyone but himself.

And thank goodness for that. I commend the community for recognizing that his behavior was very untrustworthy, and deserving of the inability to provide escrow services.

Just because escrows have alts doesn't mean they're not trustworthy.

Simply having alt accounts isn't the issue.

Escrowing deals as one of the interested parties under the pretense of being a disinterested third party is deceptive and fraudulent. And at the least, the other party involved was swindled out of the escrow fee in each instance.

Further, QS was caught using alt accounts to shill, farm trust and otherwise abuse the trust system (e.g. using multiple accounts to neg trust people). Is this how a trustworthy person acts?

On that subject, John K's feedback says it best. He was "engaging in self-collusion by the means of using alt accounts in order present a facade of trust in his business dealings." Now, why would one want to do that?

There was a reason QS was so intent on maintaining his own anonymity (a point to consider when choosing an escrow). I'll just leave this here.

Most savvy people who do business on this forum knew what Quickseller was doing. He was very clearly farming trust for months before opening up an escrow service. He was waiting for an opportunity to walk away with thousands of coins -- there is not a doubt in my mind.

All the while, he was taking the role of scam buster (often railroading people on baseless evidence) and using an army of alts to support himself in any discussion. I, for one, never mentioned a damn thing, though I suspected a lot of shady behavior for a long time -- for fear that he would target my reputation, as he has done to others. Now, the tables have turned.

Personally, I don't give a shit what happens to him. Because I know exactly what he was doing. This is not a court of law, and the point of emphasis for me is intention. Some of us know he is scum, and just don't care about these pretenses.

[Hazir]

QS may have done something "bad", but it surely didn't result in a loss for anyone but himself.

And thank goodness for that. I commend the community for recognizing that his behavior was very untrustworthy, and deserving of the inability to provide escrow services.

Just because escrows have alts doesn't mean they're not trustworthy.

Simply having alt accounts isn't the issue.

Escrowing deals as one of the interested parties under the pretense of being a disinterested third party is deceptive and fraudulent. And at the least, the other party involved was swindled out of the escrow fee in each instance.

Further, QS was caught using alt accounts to shill, farm trust and otherwise abuse the trust system (e.g. using multiple accounts to neg trust people). Is this how a trustworthy person acts?

On that subject, John K's feedback says it best. He was "engaging in self-collusion by the means of using alt accounts in order present a facade of trust in his business dealings." Now, why would one want to do that?

There was a reason QS was so intent on maintaining his own anonymity (a point to consider when choosing an escrow). I'll just leave this here.

Most savvy people who do business on this forum knew what Quickseller was doing. He was very clearly farming trust for months before opening up an escrow service. He was waiting for an opportunity to walk away with thousands of coins -- there is not a doubt in my mind.

All the while, he was taking the role of scam buster (often railroading people on baseless evidence) and using an army of alts to support himself in any discussion. I, for one, never mentioned a damn thing, though I suspected a lot of shady behavior for a long time -- for fear that he would target my reputation, as he has done to others. Now, the tables have turned.

Personally, I don't give a shit what happens to him. Because I know exactly what he was doing. This is not a court of law, and the point of emphasis for me is intention. Some of us know he is scum, and just don't care about these pretenses.

A good point about escrow anonymity. I see it now. There is a list of escrows who are not fully anonymous?
And you can know their full name, address and if something went wrong you are covered?

[Blazed]

All of the "big 5" escrows are anonymous to my knowledge. Forum rank does not mean much - just look at current feedback and make sure they are trust worthy.

[subSTRATA]

to my knowledge no deal that was escrow'd by QS or his alts was botched and no 3rd party was disappointed with the service.

Just because escrows have alts doesn't mean they're not trustworthy.

I couldn't agree more.
QS may have done something "bad", but it surely didn't result in a loss for anyone but himself.

one or two instances of something shady happening with escrow service providers is in no way representative of everyone involved in escrowing.

[poeEDgar]

A good point about escrow anonymity. I see it now. There is a list of escrows who are not fully anonymous?
And you can know their full name, address and if something went wrong you are covered?

I wouldn't put all the emphasis on this. And you're not really covered -- you'll probably find that most people that get scammed in this context don't pursue the matter in court.

Just something to consider. First and foremost, reputation is paramount.

The point I am making is this: Can an escrow be tied to a legitimate business, a physical address, a web site? Do other trusted members claim to know this person's identity outside of the forum? Are they doxxable? Or is it someone who only transacts in areas where they can remain fully anonymous (digital goods trades, or with P.O. boxes for physical trades)? If the latter, regarding someone who has gained a significant reputation over a short period (trust farming), red flags go off. That tells me someone may be planning a long con, and their complete anonymity is further incentive to exploit the high level of trust they have.

It's just a base-level incentive analysis. If you're going to scam, are you likely to use contact information/websites/services/businesses that can be tied to your real identity? It's not about stating who you are; it's about whether or not we can analyze your past business dealings to verify who you are. Scammers make efforts to cover their tracks the best they can. The sloppy ones aren't careful early on (when they weren't intent on scamming). The smarter ones know what they are doing from the start, and never release any information that can tie them to a real identity.

[Quickseller]

Why exactly would using a forum escrow not be safe? If you trust someone enough to use them as escrow then there is no rational reason why you would not trust them enough to do a direct trade with that same person, and in a worse case scenario, you would be essentially be sending first to the escrow, and since you would rationally be willing to send first to them (unless you wanted to act irrationally) so you would really not be getting tricked into sending first.

AFAIK, OgNasty is the only escrow who has publicly stated that he will not be a party to any trade that he escrows, so if you wish to be certain that the escrow is not a party to a trade, then you should use his escrow service, although I would not personally feel cheated or betrayed if it turned out that he was a party to a trade of mine that he escrowed. I have traded with OgNasty multiple times, and he was always very quick to ship and was very professional, and I think it is difficult to argue that this is someone that I would not want to be trading with, regardless of the handle I am messaging -- this really does not mater however because OgNasty does not act as escrow for deals he is a party to.

Most of my negative trust ratings are based on misinformation and/or are emotionally charged statements and/or are based on things unrelated to my escrowing my own deals.

Mitchell - I had spoken to him about his rating, and he told me that it was primarily because of the fact that I lied about being banned. He originally told me that he will eventually edit it to a neutral rating and has since followed through in doing so.

DiamondCardz - His trust rating seems to echo Mitchell's rating. I would assume that he is reasonable and will eventually update it to a neutral rating. I will probably eventually message him about his rating to discuss it, and based on the assumption that he is a reasonable person, I believe that he will either remove it or update it to a neutral.

Vod - Martain is upset that my actions represent something that makes it more difficult for Vod to force people to act in specific ways, and to listen to him. Vod's trust rating is only the latest (it is actually no longer the latest) of a long list of negative trust ratings that were left for personal reasons.

jonald_fyookball - Another emotionally charged trust rating. I am really not entirely sure why he was ever put on DefaultTrust.

cryptodevil - He is just one of multiple shills on dooglus's trust list. I would not be surprised if he turns out to be another scammer who is currently on dooglus's trust list. Regardless, his rating was pretty clearly the result of my speaking out against dooglus

John (John K.) - it appears that his rating is based on some amount of misinformation (at least based on his trust comment). I will probably eventually send him a message clarifying the situation, and based on the assumption that he is a reasonable person, I would say that he will either remove it or update it to a neutral.

I have a solid trading history, and a history of providing an escrow service that my customers have publicly stated they are/were very satisfied with. When terms of a trade that I am asked to escrow would make it impossible to mediate a dispute, I recommend alternate terms that would protect both parties, and would have a high likelihood of being able to resolve a dispute in a fair manor, and when such terms (or other terms that would allow a dispute to be mediated using facts that I can personally verify) are not agreed to then I will decline to escrow a transaction. If the terms of a trade put excessive risk on one party (eg when the instant release of bitcoin would be done after the other party will be receiving a clearly reversible payment), then I will most often explain such risks and suggest alternate terms to somewhat reduce the risk to the party taking the excessive risks. I have been trusted with large amounts of money (both while escrowing and when trading) (amounts that are greater then the aggregate value of trades that many/most people engage in over a year)multiple times, and every time I have been trust with large amounts of money, I have showed that it was appropriate to give me such trust (and the same is true when I have been trusted with smaller amounts of money). 

Over the last ~year, I have helped countless people protect themselves against getting scammed, have warned the community about countless numbers of scams, have given countless number of people advice regarding their trading practice, regarding their (giving) trust practices, among other things. Anyone that wants to speak ill of me is really only going to end up embarrassing themselves.

[Quickseller]

Ok i will risking to get -neg tagged myself but whatever

^^this is from a thread the OP made about Vod about a month ago. Not long after the OP created that thread, he did in fact receive a negative rating from Vod (no surprise here) for selling MSDN accounts. However now it appears that this trust rating is gone!

If you look at this thread (archive), you will see that the OP had a thread about selling MSDN accounts, if you look at this post (archive - reply#2), you will see that he sent a PM to someone looking to buy MSDN accounts, and if you look at this (unedited) post (archive - reply #8), you will see that someone posted Vod's trust rating.

The OP apparently started selling MSDN accounts less then 30 days ago, so the removal of Vod's trust rating cannot be explained by the OP stopping selling such accounts and 30 days elapsing.

I would like to inquire as to why exactly Vod's rating was removed from the OP

[erikalui]

QS dint yet scam anyone and hence he as an escrow can still be trusted to an extent. However, escrows need to be polite and professional on this forum rather than feel that they are the higher than the people who are using their services. Some sort of respect and acknowledgement is important which lacks on this forum. Escrowing for an alt is not appreciated at all and even the escrows leaving a rating for the people using their services as it doesn't make the members trustworthy just because they used an escrow. It's still safe to use an escrow who is in DT level 1 but it's still recommended to check their trust list.


That being it, I'm still skeptical on using some reputed escrows as I haven't interacted with them and trusting a person whom I haven't even spoken too is not what I can do. MZ has been the only escrow I've used and since he is from my country, it's easier to deal with him rather than escrows who live outside.