Safety rules for participating in airdrops

I have been participating in airdrops for some time. I can tell you now that majority of the airdrops are scams or completely worthless. Websites that hurt your eyes – or the same WordPress template for the dozens of the projects – are a red flag. Missing white papers, or displaying the same faces on the team’s section – another red flag.

But there are some great projects, with real value and it is a shame not to participate in those airdrops. Previously, we’ve had great airdrops, like Stellar. They were giving you 1,000 coins if you registered on their website. In January 2018 that was worth around $850. That is a pretty good amount, don’t you think?

Another great example of a successful bounty airdrop is the Ontology (ONT) token which is built on NEO. To participate in this airdrop you only needed to subscribe to the Ontology newsletter and you were dropped with 1000 ONT. The airdrop was held during January 2018, and when writing these lines the price for one ONT has recently crossed $4!

Also, meet the airdrop of Polymath, an ERC-20 token built on Ethereum. They had an airdrop in December 2017. For signing up on the website, users were dropped with 250 POLY. In February 2018 that was worth $400. Yes, only for signing up.

So here are the 7 tips I have collected from participating in airdrops over the past couple of months:

1. Never pay for an airdrop

If the “blockchain project” is asking you to pay in order to participate in the airdrop, get away very quickly.

2. Never share your private key

This rule applies for the everything in the crypto world, but it is good to mention it again. This is the most important rule. Never give your actual, real wallet to just anybody, right?

3. Create a new dedicated email address

I’d advise you to create a new email address that you only use for airdrops. It’s even better if you use different emails for each airdrop registration. This is possible if you have your own domain name, and you can create an email alias for every account. For example “adobe@yourdomain.com”. You won’t actually create an email, you will just forward all email coming into your one domain to an actual email address. But just creating a new email that you only use for the airdrops is the best and easiest option.

4. Never give your private email

Never give your primary email address. There are simply too many scams out there, and I’m not comfortable sharing my name with projects that aren’t yet known and established.

5. Never use the same passwords for the different websites

This rule applies for all your accounts, and especially for airdrops that require registration for their websites. Good practice is to use one of the password manager applications or an online password generator.

6. Avoid KYC airdrops if you are even a bit suspicious

KYC stands for Know Your Customer. In most cases, to participate in an ICO you will need to provide your personal data (or, to do a KYC process). But, personally if I ‘m not going to participate in the actual ICO I avoid those types of airdrops. The risk is too big, and I’m really not comfortable sharing my personal information with that kind of projects.

7. Create a new Ethereum address

Since most of the projects are built on Ethereum good practice is to create a new Ethereum address that you only use for airdrops. Even if there is no massive danger in sharing your public address, I feel safer when all those projects do not know how much Ethereum I have. More than that, data collectors like to sell this high-valued info.