Developer’s advices to ICO investor.

[hero10]

Hello, dear investors and everyone who reads this.
Being a developer of smart contracts, I cannot stand aside of the current lawlessness in the ICO market.
Out of every 100 projects 99 is a fraud, or a scam, as we used to call it.
Please, read the following advices as a guide to verification of every ICO:
1. At the start of pre-ICO team should have a contract for automatic assets transfer, that contains a written set of rules for early investors – not on towel, not in the speaking form, but written in the smart-contract.  Otherwise, collected assets can just fall in the pockets of founders, or they can change rules of the game in the middle of act – there are many examples.
2. The contract for pre-ICO should be a part of a bigger contract on ICO and do not be different tokens – it is unsafe form a standpoint of vulnerability and withdrawal of funds.
3. The contract for pre-ICO, and then on ICO should have a lower and upper barrier - if it does not – the team does not know what it wants - just a scam.
4. The contract for ICO should have escrow of the funds, received as a result of placement - it can be a frieze or multiSig with a voting condition. This will give you a guarantee against the expenditure of funds earlier than the team completed the previous stage.
5. The contract should have indisputable return of funds condition, in case of not reaching the lower limit of the collected pool. It is in the contract and not in the white book, if it is not – move on, it’s just a scum.
6. All contracts must be posted on GitHub, this will enable third-party developers to check the contract for the vulnerability, if the team has not taken care and before the ICO has not posted a bounty on the vulnerability.
7. The contract must specify the conditions for the team and for the bounty’s for vulnerability.
8. The contract must specify the conditions for not traded tokens - with clearly defined deadlines.

This post is about having a standard. Everything in the end should have a standard - and together we can achieve it. If you do not invest in teams that do not adhere to basic security standards - they just won’t be able to steal your money.

I hope for a dialogue and a healthy discussion.

[Lingqingyi]

Thank you for sharing, but most of the time, because I am not a technician, I can hardly judge the technical issues. I can only understand the background of the team and whether there are any bad records.

[Lyd]

hey guys - noob question. How do i send my XYZ tokens from metamask to exchange? I have the exchange address, i just dont how how to send anything besides ETHER with metamask.

[hero10]

hey guys - noob question. How do i send my XYZ tokens from metamask to exchange? I have the exchange address, i just dont how how to send anything besides ETHER with metamask.

If XYZ is ERC20 tokens just send it to your ethereum address. Try to send a couple of pieces at the beginning.

[waynechong1995]

I'm always concern about the security of investing in any particular ICOs when some misfortune happens like losing funds and any fishy activities that was just basically crippling the late investors. A background backbone on Github is a must for me to look through their efforts given to basically develop what they promised to achieve in the next few road-maps, some of them just uploaded some basic wallet transaction helper code and that's not helpful at all. The rest mentioned above are definitely good read as i always assumed projects would have some sort of 'early private investors' that was guaranteed to have profits once they took off, i just don't wanna be a victim that get my tokens -30% value gone on the first day it reaches any exchanges.

[tukangkopi]

Hello, dear investors and everyone who reads this.
Being a developer of smart contracts, I cannot stand aside of the current lawlessness in the ICO market.
Out of every 100 projects 99 is a fraud, or a scam, as we used to call it.
Please, read the following advices as a guide to verification of every ICO:
1. At the start of pre-ICO team should have a contract for automatic assets transfer, that contains a written set of rules for early investors – not on towel, not in the speaking form, but written in the smart-contract.  Otherwise, collected assets can just fall in the pockets of founders, or they can change rules of the game in the middle of act – there are many examples.
2. The contract for pre-ICO should be a part of a bigger contract on ICO and do not be different tokens – it is unsafe form a standpoint of vulnerability and withdrawal of funds.
3. The contract for pre-ICO, and then on ICO should have a lower and upper barrier - if it does not – the team does not know what it wants - just a scam.
4. The contract for ICO should have escrow of the funds, received as a result of placement - it can be a frieze or multiSig with a voting condition. This will give you a guarantee against the expenditure of funds earlier than the team completed the previous stage.
5. The contract should have indisputable return of funds condition, in case of not reaching the lower limit of the collected pool. It is in the contract and not in the white book, if it is not – move on, it’s just a scum.
6. All contracts must be posted on GitHub, this will enable third-party developers to check the contract for the vulnerability, if the team has not taken care and before the ICO has not posted a bounty on the vulnerability.
7. The contract must specify the conditions for the team and for the bounty’s for vulnerability.
8. The contract must specify the conditions for not traded tokens - with clearly defined deadlines.

This post is about having a standard. Everything in the end should have a standard - and together we can achieve it. If you do not invest in teams that do not adhere to basic security standards - they just won’t be able to steal your money.

I hope for a dialogue and a healthy discussion.

some of the above advice has been implemented by guts, more info please check at my signature.

[hero10]

I want to share another advice, which is not directly connected to the topic of smart contracts. At least on the face of it.
It is not that simple, to start ICO.  The team that goes to the ICO should have at least the code on the GitHab - something I repeatedly warned about in my recommendations. Any statements on the site without the presence of the code on the GitHab are a direct indicator of the scam.

https://auctus.org/
The project is solid from the developer standpoint. Has contracts, has a working prototype. The only thing that missing is an escrow - but I admit that in this context this is not the biggest mistake.

http://armorceramics.co
The site indicates the beginning of sales, but clicking on the button moves to an empty block. Perhaps this is the error of the web programmer - but first red flag is on. The page on HitHab is in development.
My conclusion: if you are trying to be real, then you should take a bigger test. SCAM.

https://playkey.io
The project takes funds for a contract in which there is only one token for all stages of sale and bonuses for early investors from our list. There are no conditions for the team, bounty, no soft and hard caps, no escrow and freezes. With such a grandiose project, getting out such an unfinished product is unacceptable from our standpoint.
According to our standard – it’s a SCAM.

https://lcd.lucyd.co
This project will receive a e-wallet payments and it’s a biggest scam-factor. To be frank, project is not innovative one bit. Founders just lazy to prove their own idea in front on investor’s board and trying to cut a quick cash. Do you really want this? Nope. Because it is scam.

http://ico.b2b-gbs.com
They managed to be cheap, even using free hosting. Nothing to say – SCAM. Another bag of dust.

I’ve been asked quite frequently about not-scam projects. This bunch was tested by my only by smart-contract standards.
https://auctus.org
https://cashaa.com
https://covesting.io
https://goldminecoin.io

These projects are all different in regard of directions, but they are all the same, as to responsibly approaching to the safety of investors' money.

[hero10]

some of the above advice has been implemented by guts, more info please check at my signature.

https://ico.guts.tickets/
You have a strange project. Those wishing to contribute to the project put in line. The code on the Github is missing. There may be a contract, but there is no access to it.

[hero10]

Scam ICO Alert Auctus, DMarket.
Video review on the SCAM from the developer of smart contracts.

https://youtu.be/ZdHnVY0JgU0

[wizzydizzycrypto]

Thank you for sharing this, I think a lot of people don't even read into the concept of the ICO, never mind the smart contract that governs the pre-ICO / ICO.

The standard needs to be raised by the crypto scene, if bad ICO's don't raise money, then they will cease to exist and develop their concept / idea to meet standards.

[tobson2]

I totally agree on the advices from a developer's point of view. But how would you handle FIAT payments in this case, which is from a business' side very crucial?

[hero10]

Another day, another review.

https://swisstok.io
Site contains one interesting detail – pre-sale is going to be over after 21 day and they still didn’t add “buy” button. I smell a bit of a scam already. Even after signing in you will receive only an invite to a sales, nothing more.

https://paytailor.com
Site does not contain “sale” button. It’ll only going to be found under the heading. As result we are shown a wallet, on which we should drop our coins. What does the team hopes for? I don’t know. It’s clearly a scam. Don’t give them money. 

http://gigagiving.com/ICO
Despite the fact that this project has git-hub link and did found collection in the right way, it has some red flags. First – tokens are going to be out at once. All of them. No burning function. No spelled out terms for the team; no bounties, no hard and softcaps. No freeze and escrow. Scam through and through. 

https://razoom.org
Project is claiming to combine AI and smart-contracts in ETH. And even after this bold claims they still collecting found on the wallet. Maybe hoping to lure some naive soul to their nets. Eh. C’mon, guys. At least do some efforts into fooling us. Scam.   

[hero10]

https://swissborg.com/en/

Before the sales begin, we have the opportunity to review code of the prototype. It could be better. Just a pack of standard functions and nothing more. Of course, there is a possibility that cherry on top will be added right before sales but for now – quite a dull project overall. 

https://tokensale.gizer.io/

Project has a spelled out terms for early investors, has soft and hard cap and token-burn. There are no terms for bounty and team, no escrow and no freeze. 50\50, but i'll put this project in a scam pile. 

[yanst]

Another day, another review.

https://swisstok.io
Site contains one interesting detail – pre-sale is going to be over after 21 day and they still didn’t add “buy” button. I smell a bit of a scam already. Even after signing in you will receive only an invite to a sales, nothing more.
   

Dear Hero10,

Swisstok now proceeding with 1st closed presale, starting with KYC/AML procedure. So, lack of the wallet or "buy" button means we're doing that in a manual mode. We are counting on dozens of participants  here, so the manual mode is much simpler than smart-contract. You are welcome to register (or https://t.me/swisstok) and see the news and test alpha version.

Swisstok

[hero10]

Another day, another review.

https://swisstok.io
Site contains one interesting detail – pre-sale is going to be over after 21 day and they still didn’t add “buy” button. I smell a bit of a scam already. Even after signing in you will receive only an invite to a sales, nothing more.
   

Dear Hero10,

Swisstok now proceeding with 1st closed presale, starting with KYC/AML procedure. So, lack of the wallet or "buy" button means we're doing that in a manual mode. We are counting on dozens of participants  here, so the manual mode is much simpler than smart-contract. You are welcome to register (or https://t.me/swisstok) and see the news and test alpha version.

Swisstok

Thank you for reply! We'll keep an eye on your project.

And meanwhile, another review.

https://fortknoxster.com
Web-site is looking quite unpresentable, and to add insult to injury – there are no GitHub link to review the code. Big “No-no”.

https://www.saavcoin.com/
Another horrible looking website with no GitHub link. No means to verify code and contract – no advices to invest in this project.

[Teraboy]

Scam ICO Alert Auctus, DMarket.
Video review on the SCAM from the developer of smart contracts.

https://youtu.be/ZdHnVY0JgU0

I've a suggestion and how about try to make a list about the result of the contract that you have been auditing it? It seems to be a very good sources for everyone to determine the ico project itself.
The smartcontract becomes a crucial part in this game, that's why majority of the scammers are hiding their code.

[yanst]

Another day, another review.

https://swisstok.io
Site contains one interesting detail – pre-sale is going to be over after 21 day and they still didn’t add “buy” button. I smell a bit of a scam already. Even after signing in you will receive only an invite to a sales, nothing more.
   

Dear Hero10,

Swisstok now proceeding with 1st closed presale, starting with KYC/AML procedure. So, lack of the wallet or "buy" button means we're doing that in a manual mode. We are counting on dozens of participants  here, so the manual mode is much simpler than smart-contract. You are welcome to register (or https://t.me/swisstok) and see the news and test alpha version.

Swisstok

Thank you for reply! We'll keep an eye on your project.

We've got an idea. We could create encrypted mail for all bitcointalk users based on our alpha. It's not a small opensource server one could download which we intent to create, but the cloud mail with fully available encryption (PGP-based). 

[hero10]

https://ins.world/

The code that we can see after following the GitHub link is weird. It does not revive ETH as payment method. After trying to pay for tokens, I was welcomed by simple wallet. Well, dream came true, again. I hope it's just a mistake and will be fixed in a shortest amount of time. If not – scam. ins.world

https://www.tokendesk.io/
The project aggregator of ICO’s goes on ICO - but the verdict is scum, because of reason that payments are accepted on the wallet and not on the contract.

[bramborakymilenec]

Thanks for the advice.

I find that the average person has no concept of the actual technology behind altcoins and are only in it because they heard about Bitcoin on the news....

[pey]

I invested in ICOs more than 5, I regret for all, because all of them are unnecessary and not profitable. Even they most fall below ico price. I just wanted to invest in 0x ico.