IMPORTANT:There are some serious conflict of interest by a moderator in the Italian thread called "HostFat". They are all related to the relationship HostFat has with an Italian crypto-exchange called Rock Trading and its owner/operator Andrea Medri (aka Eliale Morigi), CFO Rock Trading who has the username "
eliale" in this forum.
Multiple users of this forum have stated Rock Trading is a scam and left red trust in the profile for
eliale and his employee Davide Barbieri (aka Paci Barbarossa), CTO of Rock Trading who has the username "
paci in this forum".
Most if it relates to the manner in which the owner of Rock Trading has used updated ToS as an excuse for selective scamming a customer. The customer (username in this forum "Coinfan") in-turn created a Scam thread here against Rock Trading.
By all intent and purposes it seems to many of those respected members of this forum that left red trust for Rock Trading (eliale) that he has decided to design excuses to maintain holding 35,000 EURO (approximately $39,000)
I will list the points of concern one by one because they are of huge importance. I really hope the Bitcointalk Team should really take a look at this and decide if "HostFat" has behaved in an acceptable and fair manner considering all the evidence clearly points to major conflicts of interest.
I hope the Bitcointalk Team also ask themselves if HostFat is somebody they would like to continue having as a moderator after all the evidence presented.
Before explaining the specific issues, please take a look at the profile for "HostFat":
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=2031- First of all, you can see there is a signature, part of which states "
The Rock Trading (ref): A good exchange since 2007."
It is a link that opens when clicked: (
http://therocktrading.com/referral/17)
2- Second, you can see HostFat has a link in his Bitcointalk profile:
Bitcoin Foundation Italia (
https://www.bitcoin-italia.org)
So, when clicking the Bitcoin Foundation Italia link in the signature it opens a web page (
https://www.bitcoin-italia.org) which when scrolling to the very bottom has something very interesting written in Italian on the right hand side in the footer area: "
profile Disclaimer - Hosting fornito gratuitamente da The Rock Trading".
Using an online translator it loosely translates as "
profile Disclaimer - Hosting provided free by The Rock Trading"
By acknowledging the points already mentioned it shows there is a clear connection between HostFat and Rock Trading.
The first shows HostFat is promoting an unofficial Bitcoin Foundation Italia website which in turn promotes Rock Trading. The second shows HostFat himself promoting Rock Trading in the hope of financial benefit because of his unique referral as stated in the signature: therocktrading.com/referral/17
As a point of clarity, HostFat claims in his signature that Rock Trading has been "A good exchange since 2007" but we all know when Bitcoin was created. Andrea Medri (eliale) from Rock Trading himself stated several times that Rock Trading has been operating since 2011 (
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4975753.msg50365334#msg50365334) so why HostFat needs to exaggerate the date of operation is a mystery.
Keeping that aside, a clear link has been made where (HostFat) a moderator in the Italian board is clearly trying to promote Rock Trading and is clearly trying to financially benefit in affiliate commission that Rock Trading might send his way.
That in itself is not a concern because affiliates are everywhere but there is a major problem when a moderator is going beyond his remit of neutrality to give unnecessary backing to a company that the moderator benefits from in affiliate commission - even though a scam accusation has been made against it regarding approximately $39,000 of withheld crypto. Well respected members of the forum have cited Rock Trading is using every trick and every excuse in the book by selective scamming the user (Coinfan) but HostFat has a different take on it.
Keeping the two points already raised which prove a financial relationship between HostFat and Rock Trading (eliale), here are more reasons to show HostFat is going beyond his remit, is not behaving in a neutral manner and is giving unnecessary backing to Rock Trading (eliale):
3- I had never interacted with HostFat before yesterday (28th March 2019). I have no recollection of ever reading his name, profile or posts. I did in the past make an occasional post (using an online translator) in the Italian language Rock Trading scam thread created by Coinfan but never really browsed it or took much notice of it because of it being in Italian. I mostly just posted in the English language Rock Trading scam thread.
When I posted there yesterday to address the issue and list some of points that expose this to be an attempt by Rock Trading (eliale) at selective scamming Coinfan, the Italian moderator HostFat took it upon himself to post immediately after me.
To my knowledge we had never engaged in conversation before but he wrote in Italian: "
JollyGood, who wrote above, is an account used to write payment messages, probably paid by Coinfan"
To my knowledge, my reply was not met with another direct post from HostFat.
Why he thinks Coinfan would pay me or anybody else was not justified by him.
The only thing that was apparent was the manner in which HostFat jumped to the defence of Rock Trading and eliale.
4- Since HostFat initiated the accusation in the Italian language scam thread, Rock Trading owner/operator eliale decided to call me a paid mercenary in both the Italian language scam thread and the English language scam thread. It is of no consequence nor concern what eliale says to me or about me but when a moderator who should be impartial and neutral decides to side with the owner of a company that has been accused by several senior members of the community of selective scamming Coinfan - then there is a problem that the Bitcointalk Team must address.
When you look at the previous mentioned 3 points above and add to them the other issues including intimidation and bullying techniques that HostFat has thrown at Coinfan, then his behaviour becomes even more inexcusable.
In the Italian language thread you can read the following:
"
@Coinfan I again moved the message to this discussion. Until next time, I might consider deleting your next message in the other discussion, possibly blocking it, and possibly asking for your ban.
The situation of Coinfan is therocktrading is quite controversial. The risk, even probable, is that by unlocking the money for Coinfan, without being sure that his situation is completely clear (that is, that Coinfan is not involved in something illegal), it is that he puts the whole therocktrading service at risk, and therefore also all the money of its users.
35000 euros are nothing for therocktrading, but if there is something illegal (regarding the situation of Coinfan), freeing them towards Coinfan, in fact puts the whole service at risk, including the users' money, which would eventually even be seized by the authorities , for who knows how many months if not years. (you know the Italian justice ...). That is why passing to the referee would make the position of therock more secure, in freeing the money towards Coinfan."
Now, you might be wondering why I am concerned about the second part of the text that is highlighted in red when the first is clearly designed to intimidate Coinfan. Most of us would agree if a user uses an online translator such as Italian, Turkish, French etc and ends up posting on a wrong board or in the wrong place it is not a big issue. Any moderator with a bit of patience would never have made those not-so veiled threats to Coinfan or another user but tactic applied by both HostFat and eliale is the old carrot and stick technique.
They both say things within the same post that are quite strange in essence. In the above post for example where HostFat is threatening Coinfan, something else is also happening. Hostfat is defending Rock Trading and eliale by saying 35,000 EUR ($39,000) is nothing or is a small insignificant amount of money for Rock Trading but if they release the money back to Coinfan and it turns out Coinfan is a criminal then Rock Trading would get in trouble. That might well be true but when a moderator who happens to be an affiliate that is seeking money from the accused says it, there is a major conflict of interest. The reality was and still is Coinfan does not want FIAT, just wanted to get their crypto back but HostFat was very economical with the truth.
HostFat then goes on to say "
the involvement of the referee (Arbiter) is the secure way to protect Rock Trading because eventually when eliale releases the crypto back to Coinfan it will be at the say-so of the Arbiter and if Coinfan is a criminal then nothing will happen to Rock Trading and eliale because they were instructed to do so by the Arbiter."
The Arbitration mechanism as well known by HostFat was triggered by Coinfan because once they were selective scammed by Rock Trading there was no way they would send anything to them. If it was FIAT related they would have but it was a crypto withdrawal which was denied even though the CTO Davide Barbieri (aka Paci Barbarossa) made it clear the KYC would not apply to anybody who wanted to withdraw crypto (
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4975753.0). HostFat knew all this and still sided with Rock Trading while pretending to be somewhat 'neutral' by playing ignorant.
5- The owner/operator of Rock Trading eliale posted the first name of Coinfan in the forum on several occasions without consent, thus breaching that trust. It was reckless thing to do because many others may start posting claiming to be "the real" victim of the scam. It was also an attempt to intimidate Coinfan by referring to the first name and gender in several posts.
Thanks to a user who post in the scam thead, I have copied the following:
The EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) states
https://eugdpr.org/the-regulation/gdpr-faqs/:
What constitutes personal data?
The GDPR applies to ‘personal data’, meaning any information relating to an identifiable person who can be directly or indirectly identified in particular by reference to an identifier. This definition provides for a wide range of personal identifiers to constitute personal data, including name, identification number, location data or online identifier, reflecting changes in technology and the way organizations collect information about people.
This means the owner/operator of a crypto/FIAT exchange called Rock Trading which is based in Italy within the European Union, has broken GDPR laws.
However, there should be no allegation of anybody posting the name of the owner of Rock Trading (which to my knowledge Coinfan did not) because yes myself and others did - including a user leaving it being in his feedback but this was not a breach of any trust because the owner of Rock Trading signed his own post as "Andrea Medri TRT CFO":
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4975753.msg44951057#msg44951057 and both
eliale and
paci give their real names, their aliases and their email addresses here:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=894233.0Being a moderator, HostFat should have asked the owner/operator of Rock Trading (eliale) about why he was posting the name of a user/customer that was in dispute with his company over 35,000 EUR ($39,000) that was being withheld. HostFat chose to turn a blind-eye to that but the question arises
why is HostFat desperately defending Rock Trading and eliale?
Is it really that simple that he has been operating on the Italian language board for so long that he feels he can do anything without consequences and with complete impunity?
Is it simply because he is an affiliate of Rock Trading and is getting affiliate fees (financial benefit and free web hosting for Bitcoin Foundation Italia) therefore it means he is unable to remain impartial and neutral in the very forum that he was supposed to moderate?
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In his feedback, eliale deliberately incorrectly states I am a paid mercenary and cites the wholly false and unacceptable comments by the Italian language board moderator HostFat as the rationale for it.
Rock Trading owner eliale has copied/pasted that link in various posts just to try to undermine the case Coinfan has lodged with Arbitration Team and to create misdirection to deflect attention away from the real issue which is that Rock Trading has tried to selective scam a customer to the value of 35,000 EURO ($39,000) but it backfired spectacularly because the user opened an English language and Italian language scam thread which resulted in the scam being exposed and being discussed openly by anybody and everybody from newbies to senior members of the community.
I think it is fair that HostFat is disciplined by the Bitcointalk Team and the post (where he made the false allegation against me:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5025233.msg50341814#msg50341814) is edited or deleted.
Furthermore I would like an apology from HostFat (by virtue of him being in a privileged position of a moderator) because I have not taken money from Coinfan to raise the issue of Rock Trading scam. My signature has many scams listed that I want people to know about and be safe from.
I also think HostFat should apologise to Coinfan for falsely accusing them of paying me to raise the Rock Trading scam issue.
I also think HostFat should apologise to Coinfan for the disgusting and unacceptable attempt at bullying and intimidating by threatening to unfairly delete posts and possibly ban.
The conflict of interest between HostFat and Rock Trading (eliale) is blatantly obvious for everybody to see and the reasons for HostFat desperately defending Rock Trading and eliale should hopefully not be ignored by the Bitcointalk Team and the community in general.
Personally I feel that given what has been stated here, HostFat should no longer be a moderator on this great forum because he does not possess the required/expected attributes and etiquettes.
