HitBTC - SCAM !!! Watch out!!!

[kopam]

As many of you might know, HitBTC AGAIN has "deposit problems". Mainly its with TRX but also coinlancer and other tokens.

I am not trying to promote any other exchanges or anything like that. This post is here to raise awareness and protect others from getting scammed.


So to get things started, this is not the first time HitBTC had problems with the TRX deposit's and well with other coins as well.
As of right now people are waiting between 4 and 20 days to get their deposits... while in the same time, the system health page - https://hitbtc.com/system-health is clearly showing that there are NO problems with the deposits, so other people can do the same mistake, so many did.

They VERY well know that they have problems with the deposits, but there is NO warning whatsoever and anyone can generate a " deposit address " and send the coins to them to steal...
Last time the problem was "fixed" and there was info at twitter etc.
This time however here is the situation:

- NO warning on the HitBTC web page that there might be something wrong with deposits
- NO warning on the system health page - actually its the opposite, it states that the wallet is online and working (it changes from time to time, but for the last 3 days it was mostly Live and running)
- They removed/ closed all threads in the forum and are redirecting people to a thread generated by them - https://forum.hitbtc.com/discussion/8381/trx-tron-missing-deposit-provide-your-hash-here/p1
In this thread  they are asking people to copy paste the TX Id etc - ARE YOU KIDDING ME? You are fixing a deposit problem BY ASKING PEOPLE? So what stops me from simply copy pasting any of the bigger transactions and claiming it to be mine? ... I assume this is just a distraction, to calm everyone down, by saying that people are "working on it"
- They started moving deposit addresses but DO NOT give the coins to the owners, you can see that in this TX:
https://etherscan.io/token/Tronix?a=0x27250efad283aed390f75d8047064d06db72ee7b
https://etherscan.io/token/Tronix?a=0xa20c9b854a7593486eee85cdcb25a38bfab5c90b
https://etherscan.io/token/Tronix?a=0x27250efad283aed390f75d8047064d06db72ee7b
https://etherscan.io/token/Tronix?a=0x27250efad283aed390f75d8047064d06db72ee7b
https://etherscan.io/token/Tronix?a=0xe201439584975d1b013c92230cf5824caa916542

And many more, anyone can check the thread and check the transactions. Most of them were moved to the HitBTC main wallet.

After that the main wallet was split into different wallets and now all coins are moved to another wallets and STILL there is nothing in the users accounts...
- They send out ONLY generic reply's to tickets and in the forum - even if you have half a brain you can see that its simple copy paste generic answers...


But now lets get to the goodies ...
For anyone who will say that this is not a scam and that everyone will get his coins:

Check this for yourself - EVERY time they have deposit problems with a coin - this coin is in a pump!
Just compare the timelines people had problems with any coin at HitBTC and check the graphs!

When you add the simple fact that HitBTC is listing ANY shitcoin/shit project as long as they have the exclusive for a period of time ... it gets pretty clear that THIS is the actual scam, EVEN if they give all coins back!

Here is how it works:
- They choose a coin that they will be pump/dumping together with some of the bigger groups.
- At the start of the pump, they open a huge gap between any other exchange and HitBTC, so it looks like the price at HitBTC is 20 to 50% better!
- All day traders and investors in this coin, driven by the desire to sell at a better price, start depositing at HitBTC.
- At this point EVERYTHING looks perfect at HitBTC, no problems, everything seems to be perfect
- People are waiting for the coins, but at this moment "the problems" start
- HitBTC waits a couple of days, until people start getting mad, and sends out a generic message to all of them, that crypto is hard and they are doing everything in their power to fix the problem (well maybe you should have stopped registrations like every other decent exchange when you cant handle it...)
- People are now a bit calmer, since well ... what can they do ...
- A few more days pass, people start getting mad again - they send out another generic message etc.
- At some point "the problem is fixed" and everyone gets his coins
- However the pump is over and since everyone is really scared of loosing his coins - people sell at a heavy loos (guess to whom they sell... yeah HitBTC  sold at the highest point of the pump and now they are getting YOUR coins for free. But what else can you do? No one would risk a TRX withdrawal after this problems ... so i you wanna cash out, you need to do it via another currency ... no matter what you do, they will get your coins.
- Now its time for the congratulatory post at twitter, stating that HitBTC was open even before dinosaurs, every custom got his money and a blowjob and they are the only exchange accepting new customers (ofc they do ...)


I am not asking anyone to take this as a fact, the good thing is that everything can be checked! Do your own research! Check the HitBTC twitter account and find out when they had problems with coins, check the graph at coinmarketcap to see if there was a pump/dump at this moment, check out the movement in their main wallets  - its all there and anyone can see it.


To be honest, i do not believe that any of the TRX deposits will go trough! They will invent some fancy story and will have people waiting for 30+ days for a fucking DEPOSIT... after that i dont know ... i just hope this is not the next mtgox, cryptsy, mintpal etc ... got burned in each and every exchange that busted, and it seems next one is coming.
Its simply not possible for this people, that do such scams, to not scam EVERYONE at some point.

I also believe that many of the crypto web pages are being paid from HitBTC, so they do not share any stories on this scams that they perform.

Its up to us, the users that believe in crypto, to protect it and make sure that it has a future. Exchanges like HitBTC are driving people away from crypto and giving tools in the hands of governments to ask for more regulations! By the scams of a big crypto exchange like this - every single participant in the crypto world is suffering!

Check for yourself and when you see everything - tell everyone, tell your friends, post it on any page you can find, any social media etc. People need to be aware that HitBTC is a scam and they might NEVER get the coins they deposit there! THERE ARE NO WARNINGS on the HitBTC site, so people keep on depositing and there are no complains every single day!

[afkarafian]

seriously? damn it -___-

[kopam]

seriously? damn it -___-

This is just my research, you can check for yourself But i have little hope to get my TRX and its around 40k$ ... I just cant believe i did not do my research for this shit exchange earlier ...
Dont let other people make the same mistake ... it all looks good, until they fuck you...

[kumiskura]

it's not the first time we're seeing this,
and until now it's not been resolved yet by them,sent the ticket and others.
you can check it on Scam Acussation board,
as far as i know,2 people claimed to be a 'victim' just like you and lost for more than $10k.
but nothing will change,another victim will appear in the future.
because they will scam us as long as we're using their service.
just like poloniex did to their costumer,
lately every exchanges doing a stupid activity behind the scene

[kopam]

This is not just "problems that they have, since its crypto" - this is an obvious scam and they are part of pump and dump groups.
THIS is what gives crypto a bad name and yes there is something we can do! We can tell everyone so new people coming to crypto, dont get scammed as well.

[mastaprof44]

Watchout

[mekky1990]

there is two exchanges always do this trick HitBtc an stocksexchange 

[amrulshare]

why you are not looking for more information about HitBTC, they have a very bad reputation by listing the crypto HYIP and Ponzi   https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2556342.0

[HassaanAbdeen]

Thank you OP for the detailed clarification.

CoinEgg did the same with IFC and XLM. I ended up liquidating my coins to BTC in loss to salvage what remained after the dump and moved all out to Binance.

PS In light of your thorough post, I’m cancelling my HITBTC account that’s been pending verification for a while now.

[Cashwave]

Thanks for the info,one needs to be careful with some of these exchanges.

[kopam]

Most exchanges are doing that, its just that the bigger they are, the bigger coins they can scam, pump/dump etc.

And yes i agree that it was a mistake on my part, that i did not do an extensive research about HitBTC. Now that i am digging in, i am finding all the problems.

But what amazes me is that in order to find this problems, you actually need to take your time and search a lot.

Why are there no news on the big crypto pages? Why are there so few posts in Twitter/FB about this- from all the "famous" guys in crypto...

If this does not go public - there will be more and more burned users and eventually there will be another mtgox... but this time it will be much worse...
Tell your friends and share the news!

[kopam]

Thank you OP for the detailed clarification.

CoinEgg did the same with IFC and XLM. I ended up liquidating my coins to BTC in loss to salvage what remained after the dump and moved all out to Binance.

PS In light of your thorough post, I’m cancelling my HITBTC account that’s been pending verification for a while now.

The more people that do that, the better for everyone in crypto!
I am sure you can do your own research about exchanges and try to find the best option! But DO the research ... dont make the same mistake, as i did ...

[jorenpo]

is the coin you transfer is from another exchange or direct to your mew? i encounter this kind of problem when i transfer my token from exchange. after i message the support they fixed it.

[kopam]

is the coin you transfer is from another exchange or direct to your mew? i encounter this kind of problem when i transfer my token from exchange. after i message the support they fixed it.

Does not matter, you can see that there are hundreds of people with deposits not showing up. Some of them used another exchange, some used MEW ... its all the same.
I was also searching for another reason - but there is none - even HitBTC said that there is no problem with what you are saying, but they have " technical issues " ...

[DOUBLEKAY11]

This is really an eye opening information. Thank you so much, i will have to ensure i double check exchanges as well before signing up, especially that i would have signed up for HitBC through the encouragement of a friend who probably do not have this privileged information.
Thanks.

[kopam]

This is what they use! They hope that people wont check online for more infromations, but will simply open an acc and deposit there, only because the coin he likes is ONLY listed on that exchange .... and after you go there, the nightmares start.

This is really an eye opening information. Thank you so much, i will have to ensure i double check exchanges as well before signing up, especially that i would have signed up for HitBC through the encouragement of a friend who probably do not have this privileged information.
Thanks.

[kopam]

It even states they are taking in deposits now, with hundreds of customers not getting TRX....
https://gyazo.com/12d968415bbf47934bf8edd11b777aa4

[kopam]

There are still NO updates! In the same time the system health page states that everything is up and running and they keep accepting new TRX deposits - when they CLEARLY know that they can deposit it to customer accounts at this point.
So instead of closing the deposits and fixing the issue - they just keep on accepting deposits and keep on screwing customers ...

STAY OUT OF HITBTC!

[hitbtc]

kopam, thank you for your detailed report and raising so many topics to discuss.

So to get things started, this is not the first time HitBTC had problems with the TRX deposit's and well with other coins as well.

In any kind of business technical issues arise from time to time. Our goal is to solve them, and we've been doing that for nearly 5 years now. Hasn't every issue had been eventually resolved?

- NO warning on the HitBTC web page that there might be something wrong with deposits

We are taking major steps in improving our notification system. The System Health section, for example, is brand new and is being updated almost on a daily basis. Furthermore, there is nothing wrong with deposits. Once your transaction is confirmed on the blockchain, you're entitled to your coins and you'll receive them.

Anyone can generate a " deposit address " and send the coins to them to steal...

Anyone can generate a deposit address, send coins to their accounts and start trading - this is what's going on on our exchange 24/7. In the meantime we're making sure that deposit delays won't take place again in the future.

- They removed/ closed all threads in the forum and are redirecting people to a thread generated by them - https://forum.hitbtc.com/discussion/8381/trx-tron-missing-deposit-provide-your-hash-here/p1

To keep the forum clean and convenient for other traders to look through and search for necessary info.

In this thread  they are asking people to copy paste the TX Id etc - ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
You are fixing a deposit problem BY ASKING PEOPLE?

Asking our traders helps a lot.
It doesn't mean that if you haven't reported the deposit issue to us, you can say goodbye to your coins. But it's a perfect idea to report the issue to issue solving team.

So what stops me from simply copy pasting any of the bigger transactions and claiming it to be mine?

To learn the answer to your question we suggest that you actually try this.

I assume this is just a distraction, to calm everyone down, by saying that people are "working on it"

It's not "just a distraction", but yes, we also care to keep our community in peace of mind, so they would know that the team of professionals is maintaining their crypto routine 24/7.

- They started moving deposit addresses but DO NOT give the coins to the owners, you can see that in this TX:
https://etherscan.io/token/Tronix?a=0x27250efad283aed390f75d8047064d06db72ee7b
https://etherscan.io/token/Tronix?a=0xa20c9b854a7593486eee85cdcb25a38bfab5c90b
https://etherscan.io/token/Tronix?a=0x27250efad283aed390f75d8047064d06db72ee7b
https://etherscan.io/token/Tronix?a=0x27250efad283aed390f75d8047064d06db72ee7b
https://etherscan.io/token/Tronix?a=0xe201439584975d1b013c92230cf5824caa916542

The exchange is a complicated mechanism, which uses blockchain a lot. What you have just described is a part of routine exchange operation, which is up and running perfectly fine and has nothing to do with proper account balance changes.

Check this for yourself - EVERY time they have deposit problems with a coin - this coin is in a pump!
Just compare the timelines people had problems with any coin at HitBTC and check the graphs!
Here is how it works:
- They choose a coin that they will be pump/dumping together with some of the bigger groups.
- At the start of the pump, they open a huge gap between any other exchange and HitBTC, so it looks like the price at HitBTC is 20 to 50% better!
- All day traders and investors in this coin, driven by the desire to sell at a better price, start depositing at HitBTC.
- At this point EVERYTHING looks perfect at HitBTC, no problems, everything seems to be perfect
- People are waiting for the coins, but at this moment "the problems" start...

What you have described is called a "survivorship bias".
The truth is that during the periods of some coins' extremely peaking popularity a lot of people are involved in operations with this coin. Therefore in case of any, even slight minor issue a lot of people can be affected, the word being spread. Add that to an already tense atmosphere, formed around a hot coin - because it won't be hot forever. It's simply easier to notice issue with a live blazing coin than with any other. That's how that impression is formed.

When you add the simple fact that HitBTC is listing ANY shitcoin/shit project as long as they have the exclusive for a period of time ... it gets pretty clear that THIS is the actual scam, EVEN if they give all coins back!

We are listing what people want to trade, and we let them to decide what is or isn't worth trading.
Furthermore, we run a background check for any project we're listing on our exchange.

Here is how it works:
No one would risk a TRX withdrawal after this problems ... so i you wanna cash out, you need to do it via another currency ...

Use the System Health and the blockchain to learn how TRX withdrawals are processed. (Perfectly fine.)

To be honest, i do not believe that any of the TRX deposits will go trough!

You probably think that not a single TRX deposit is going through right now?
They actually do. A small portion of them, sent before January 18th, could have been delayed, but we're taking care of it and all of them will proceed. We would be glad to report it to you.

Check for yourself and when you see everything - tell everyone, tell your friends, post it on any page you can find, any social media etc.

That is a reasonable advice. But we believe that spreading of poorly checked, contrived, unstudied info is actually the thing that keeps people away from crypto. We are here for you, and we will be glad to explain anything you're concerned about, since we are perfectly aware of how HitBTC actually operates and we are proud to be a part of it.

[kopam]

I did not actually believe that you would post a reply anywhere, since there was none at twitter or in the forum.
Everything you explained sounds logical and that just might be the case, BUT... not giving any information to your customers definitely fire ups the situation more then anything.
Sending automated e-mails is okay if you have a more wider problem, but not giving at least 1 simple message with an update of the situation is what brings people to think the worst.
I would like to believe that everything you say is correct and that it was just a technical problem that will be solved soon. But for the moment, from all the people in the forum and in different chat rooms, only 3 reported of getting the coins. I did not get anything yet and its been more then 6 days.
There are plenty of customers waiting even longer then me.
Releasing an official statement is something that your customers deserve and something that can calm everyone down.

For the moment i keep waiting for the deposit and definitely WILL update if it arrives. Also will update the thread if everyone in the threads reports that the problem was fixed.

Anyone interested in depositing in ANY exchange should first check the current situation around it and make an informative decision, this is simply a MUST.