ALERT: Bitcoin Scam Modus Operandi

[ikhub]

This is an incident involving someone trying t scam me. I understood the modus operandi and thought of sharing with the community so that it may help someone in the same situation.
long story short
Came across a facebook post in a group by someone who says that he will send bitcoins first and then come to a deal.
Out of curiosity, I sent him a pm asking about the deal.
He said, I need to provide the user id and password of blockchain account, he will send me 1 BTC. After receiving it, I have to send him back 0.5 btc.
Smelling something fishy, and wanted to understand what the catch is, I created a new wallet in blockchain and sent him the credentials.
Within a few minutes he asked me to check balance.
OMG OMG I was surprised to see the wallet balance 1 BTC.
Now he asks me to send him 0.5 BTC back as the deal was.
Now I checked the transaction history of the wallet, it was not a "received' amount; It was a random address imported (without private key, "Watch Only") and the last transaction was dated a fortnight ago.
Since it was imported without the private key, the balance shows in the wallet, but I don't have access to the fund.
Anyone without understanding the situation might think that he received 1 btc and send him 0.5 btc (which would be deducted if he had balance).
Sharing this with others so that no one falls in this kind of trap, even if the amount is small.

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[marlboroza]

I don't understand this topic.
Someone asked you password and wallet ID, you gave it to him and you are warning everyone not to do this?
Why would anyone share password and ID?
I just don't get it.

[burakdat]

These are the things why china ban the cryptpcurrency in thier country. A lot of chinese people involved in scam and that is according the news release within that country. This is how they work they involved in giving you btc and in return you have to give him btc as well. So if ever you are not techie about the btc you are receiving then probably you will send btc to that person and that is how they work. However, hacking bitcoin system may seem too complicated from its data decryption that could take many years before 1 btc to be cracked down. So BTC id more secure investment than any other investment. The only thing is thay these scammers had different kind of idea on scamming. So if ever someone has to offer good deals then do not forget that it may be related to scam.

[gantez]

I would say you are lucky not to finally lose your  money to that fraudster. Again, I would say you are smarter to have downloaded new wallet to send because if you had sent with your old wallet , perhaps you would have sent him the 0.5 he requested for after seeing the imaginary bitcoin.

[moneyangel]

Please think it many times that who this guy will give you a 1BTC and in returned you will give him a 0.5BTC. They are professional on that type of scam. I seen a lot at telegram channel but I never entertained them.
I never trust someone in the internet not unless they have a good reputation like in here in bitcointalk.

[bL4nkcode]

I encountered this so many times in my site and even in my youtube videos, people there asked me if how can they get a private key of watched only address, And I told them that's impossible and there's no way to that.

When I asked them what really happens and someone told me that she met a guy in facebook, and this guy told her that he will give her bitcoin/s in exchange with her blockchain's login details. The same with OP this guy imported a wallet address, obviously it became watch only address and he get the funds on that wallet too I guess its 0.005 IIRC.

That's why its so stupid that someone will give you some sort of free money in exchange of your wallet's login details. So stop believing it.

[Silent26]

I don't understand this topic.
Someone asked you password and wallet ID, you gave it to him and you are warning everyone not to do this?
Why would anyone share password and ID?
I just don't get it.

I think this topic is somehow helpful. Yes you're right, he gave his password and Wallet ID but it's a new wallet. It's just fine to send it to anyone since there's no bitcoin in it. It's just for testing if the person he encountered is really going to give him 1 Bitcoin. Luckily, he noticed that the bitcoin in his wallet is not received and just a fraud. He made this topic just to warn everyone, and it is a good idea.The lesson from this topic is, don't trust someone easily. Most of all are people from social medias. Because fraud is everywhere, just waiting for their right time to victim us.

[VitKoyn]

Well only people with poor thinking and people that don't have enough knowledge in cryptocurrency will be victimized by this. When someone ask for your private key or anything that can be use to access your Bitcoin wallet, that is enough reason not to transact with those people they will surely do nothing good. And also why would anyone will send you 1 Bitcoin and give him half of it after you receive it, if he can keep that 1 Bitcoin by himself? lol. No one with straight mind will give 1 Bitcoin for free without having anything valuable in exchange. This is a lesson that should everyone know especially those people that are just starting investing in cryptocurrency, never transact with other people without an escrow service because Bitcoin/cryptocurrency transactions are irreversible.

[TravelMug]

Well only people with poor thinking and people that don't have enough knowledge in cryptocurrency will be victimized by this. When someone ask for your private key or anything that can be use to access your Bitcoin wallet, that is enough reason not to transact with those people they will surely do nothing good. And also why would anyone will send you 1 Bitcoin and give him half of it after you receive it, if he can keep that 1 Bitcoin by himself? lol. No one with straight mind will give 1 Bitcoin for free without having anything valuable in exchange. This is a lesson that should everyone know especially those people that are just starting investing in cryptocurrency, never transact with other people without an escrow service because Bitcoin/cryptocurrency transactions are irreversible.

But there's still a lot of people who fall for this trap and its good that the OP has given us a warning about the said modus operandi. Lessons here is not to trust anyone, specially people you really don't know and just met online.

They are taking advantage of those people in the crypto that will jump because of the huge offer of 1 BTC, lest they know that they are going to be another statistics from those scammers out there.

So just be really careful, don't be greedy and used our common sense and not be a victim here. I myself have been scam in the beginning of my career in a HYIP, but since then I said that I will not be victimized again.

[milewilda]

Well only people with poor thinking and people that don't have enough knowledge in cryptocurrency will be victimized by this. When someone ask for your private key or anything that can be use to access your Bitcoin wallet, that is enough reason not to transact with those people they will surely do nothing good. And also why would anyone will send you 1 Bitcoin and give him half of it after you receive it, if he can keep that 1 Bitcoin by himself? lol. No one with straight mind will give 1 Bitcoin for free without having anything valuable in exchange. This is a lesson that should everyone know especially those people that are just starting investing in cryptocurrency, never transact with other people without an escrow service because Bitcoin/cryptocurrency transactions are irreversible.

But there's still a lot of people who fall for this trap and its good that the OP has given us a warning about the said modus operandi. Lessons here is not to trust anyone, specially people you really don't know and just met online.

They are taking advantage of those people in the crypto that will jump because of the huge offer of 1 BTC, lest they know that they are going to be another statistics from those scammers out there.

So just be really careful, don't be greedy and used our common sense and not be a victim here. I myself have been scam in the beginning of my career in a HYIP, but since then I said that I will not be victimized again.

This is the sad truth where theres still people who do fall out these kind of scams specially for those people who do lack of knowledge together with their greediness will really result into such loss.Checking on the situation above its really involve on technical aspects even a newbie would really be still confused and would easily fall to the trap that he do recieve 1 btc and yet it is just imported watch-only wallet then you will really able to see the balance.If you dont have 0.5 btc balance then you did actually follow his instruction and sent out 0.5 and then fail then you are lucky.

[batang_bitcoin]

And also why would anyone will send you 1 Bitcoin and give him half of it after you receive it, if he can keep that 1 Bitcoin by himself?

That's the logic, easy to understand and I don't know why they are needing other people just to do this shady transaction.

I encountered this so many times in my site and even in my youtube videos

I've seen on a certain freelancing group on facebook that there are alike offers.
Good warning to all, just don't be greedy and don't fall for people who are saying "I'll give you, XXX amount and send XXX back to me." Don't believe them.

[shi07]

If a deal is too good to be true then it probably is. Anyone here who have been using blockchain somehow understands when a transaction is legit or not. Don't get easily fooled with this kind of offers. Besides who would give a .5 btc that easily? Beware of scammers, they are the one who gives negative impression of btc.

[BluberryBTC]

It's a clever scam but I don't think anyone will hand over a wallet with any funds in it. If they do then they shouldn't be owning any bitcoin to begin with.

Also nothing is free. People don't give free things out of the 'goodness of their hearts'.

[glowing10]

It's a clever scam but I don't think anyone will hand over a wallet with any funds in it. If they do then they shouldn't be owning any bitcoin to begin with.

Also nothing is free. People don't give free things out of the 'goodness of their hearts'.

It is not at all clever, it is like asking your id and password of the bank details and you are providing him. On the first place itself you will not provide and in the same way why will anyone should or will provide the id and password of their personal wallet? This itself is the real cause of the problem and thus those scammers get succeed due to the ignorance or blindly trusting the people.

[BluberryBTC]

It's a clever scam but I don't think anyone will hand over a wallet with any funds in it. If they do then they shouldn't be owning any bitcoin to begin with.

Also nothing is free. People don't give free things out of the 'goodness of their hearts'.

It is not at all clever, it is like asking your id and password of the bank details and you are providing him. On the first place itself you will not provide and in the same way why will anyone should or will provide the id and password of their personal wallet? This itself is the real cause of the problem and thus those scammers get succeed due to the ignorance or blindly trusting the people.

Let me re-phase;

It's clever compared to the usual, "Hello, I'm a nigerian prince, plz send money" scam that I have seen a few of on this forum.

[andrei56]

Thanks for the description op of the scam but while I value the service, you took a great risk,the best way to avoid being scammed is to simply stay away from scammers do not listen to them, while I have never being scammed I understand very clearly they know their scam very well and that if I tried to be smarter than them I am the only one that is going to be hurt by it.

[audaciousbeing]

There is way we can get enough of all these scams because they are just getting smarter to wipe funds people have worked to build and I am very sure a lot of people would have fallen for this type of scam. I must admit this is the first time I am hearing this form of scam and I think Op is even smart to have opened a new wallet to try it out such a "good deal" is something that does not come every time.

But for this who fell of the scam, I think its out of greediness because there is no way you should send from your own wallet rather from the one he sent which is not going to happen. I guess they would have been told they have to wait for a while before they would be able to spend only to realise when its too late. One word, when you are not sure, don't bother to dig deep nothing is free around here.

[erickkyut]

Thank you for sharing this to the community. It is the first time I've encountered such scam strategy. The scammers really had evolved. They will do everything just to scam others and get their hard earned money. It is such a pity that they don't know how to fight fair in life. I hope that they will change their mind and heart and they will not get the worst karma out there.

[Zadicar]

Thank you for sharing this to the community. It is the first time I've encountered such scam strategy. The scammers really had evolved. They will do everything just to scam others and get their hard earned money. It is such a pity that they don't know how to fight fair in life. I hope that they will change their mind and heart and they will not get the worst karma out there.

Nothing to be surprised of which scammers will really evolve no matter what as the trend on making money increased and if people already find out their techniques on scamming they will evolve into something unique that nobody able to see it.I have seen already in social medias about this wallet or btc being given by someone and newbie person easily fooled out that they do really own that btc.This is a new way of scamming where if you let yourself blinded with that amount then you know the consequences.

[Nhor1011]

      Scammers are so smart,they have different strategies how to convince people to go in their net. And if you are not aware you will surely fall. Well, thanks for sharing this,because evreyone now will become carefull enough and always don't trust to anyone to avoid scam.