Don't share your first email or KYC documents with every bounty or airdrop!!!

[darkangel11]

I don't know how many of you have had the "pleasure" of working in technical support. I did and I can tell you that sending or not sending KYC is not the main problem. The big issue is sending KYC documents where they belong. I was in technical and there was a whole separate KYC department with a different email. The department was getting documents in a secure channel through a form in user's personal account but people did not care. They would send their IDs and other documents like utility bills everywhere, to every department and any email they could find on the site. They would even drop it in the chatbot window thinking that if they put it everywhere it will speed up the process.

Don't do it people. Don't be reckless with your documents. You don't know how valuable a genuine ID is and how easy it is to swap a picture.

[Pmalek]

They would even drop it in the chatbot window thinking that if they put it everywhere it will speed up the process.

Don't do it people. Don't be reckless with your documents. You don't know how valuable a genuine ID is and how easy it is to swap a picture.

Do you remember the April fools jokes that theymos did back in April!? When he created that topic regarding a mandatory KYC on the forum. Many users voluntarily uploaded they IDs in the thread for everyone to see. Any scammer could have had access to them and could do whatever he felt like!

[wwzsocki]

...The big issue is sending KYC documents where they belong...The department was getting documents in a secure channel through a form in user's personal account but people did not care. They would send their IDs and other documents like utility bills everywhere, to every department and any email they could find on the site...

This is the first time I hear about this, thanks for sharing.

I still can't get over when I hear similar stories or examples, how thoughtless people in mid-age are, because if they were children or teenagers they could be forgiven, but adults?

I wonder what happened further with all these documents which were sent to wrong emails in different departments?

Were they finally sent to the appropriate KYC department or no one did care and they ended up in bins or worse on the black market?

[darkangel11]

...The big issue is sending KYC documents where they belong...The department was getting documents in a secure channel through a form in user's personal account but people did not care. They would send their IDs and other documents like utility bills everywhere, to every department and any email they could find on the site...

This is the first time I hear about this, thanks for sharing.

I still can't get over when I hear similar stories or examples, how thoughtless people in mid-age are, because if they were children or teenagers they could be forgiven, but adults?

I wonder what happened further with all these documents which were sent to wrong emails in different departments?

Were they finally sent to the appropriate KYC department or no one did care and they ended up in bins or worse on the black market?

Usually a department email was shared between 2 or 3 employees. Sometimes it was just one person. I didn't have access to their mail so I cannot say what they did with all that stuff. The general rule was to either delete it or forward it to KYC and then delete. If that leaked out you wouldn't know who did it and when because you can't expect someone in sales to remember to delete a selfie of some guy from Botswana, who happens to be sending his pictures everywhere. There are employees who handle sensitive information and are paid well to do it, and those who get minimum wage and will not care, so keep your IDs safe and send only in proper channels.
Many exchanges have external companies that handle KYC for them and are responsible for making sure their clients don't find their data on a TOR marketplace.

[wwzsocki]

...There are employees who handle sensitive information and are paid well to do it, and those who get minimum wage and will not care, so keep your IDs safe and send only in proper channels...

I am very happy that you referred to the topic of money, and more specifically payments to employees dealing with confidential data in your post, because this is a very important, if not fundamental factor, which in fact can affect the security of the entire KYC operation, also for an external rented service for this purpose.

...Many exchanges have external companies that handle KYC for them and are responsible for making sure their clients don't find their data on a TOR marketplace...

Such an external KYC company/service was already a couple of times responsible for the documents leaks, the best example will be the latest Binance leak. Here link: https://www.binance.com/en/blog/365766157488967680/Statement-on-False-KYC-Leak. No matter if this example is 100% accurate just look at the big picture.

It only happened because some external service has just been rented to conduct KYC for Binance. Everything would be good if such services would pay its employees, in particular, those who have access and deal with confidential data. Instead, the majority of them are created from employees hired in the cheapest areas on earth. Sometimes such services are fully online and nobody from employees never sees each other life. So we all have to agree that the hall security of such an online KYC verifier is so strong as a single-computer from a third country guy who was lucky to get the spot.

I know and there are legit services but we have to take into consideration that in begin of this all KYC helping services and true verifiers there was and for sure still is a lot of scam going on.
I was (not once) interviewed by a woman during KYC from countries like ... I don't want to hurt anyone so I just say 3rd countries. This woman even doesn't pronounce English on an acceptable level to do this process smooth and fast which also only costs more money.

In my opinion, full KYC is the best way to lose all your personal data at a single click these days and we really should do it only if is needed and with reputable companies.

[smyslov]

There are many ways of verifying the identity of a person. The ICO, bounty and airdrops are collecting the personal identities illegally and selling them in the dark market.
That's why I'd rather talk to the bounty manager personally in a video call but never provide my personal documents.

Do we have a bounty manager, that accepts video call to verify or accept your KYC, I Have not found a bounty campaign that does that, some KYC is done, in the websites, bounty manager has nothing to do with verification of bounty participants, they have different team that does that, it's really not recommended to use your main email this is to avoid so many spam email, anyway you can always report these emails.

[MFahad]

I don't know how many of you have had the "pleasure" of working in technical support. I did and I can tell you that sending or not sending KYC is not the main problem. The big issue is sending KYC documents where they belong. I was in technical and there was a whole separate KYC department with a different email. The department was getting documents in a secure channel through a form in user's personal account but people did not care. They would send their IDs and other documents like utility bills everywhere, to every department and any email they could find on the site. They would even drop it in the chatbot window thinking that if they put it everywhere it will speed up the process.

Don't do it people. Don't be reckless with your documents. You don't know how valuable a genuine ID is and how easy it is to swap a picture.

When we submit the documents online, we do not know which department will receive them. usually every KYC has a similar process and if we are sending the documents we have to trust the site, else do not use it.
Example localbitcoins, made it mandatory KYC if we want to use that site. Now we have no option but to submit our KYC else quit the site.

There are many ways of verifying the identity of a person. The ICO, bounty and airdrops are collecting the personal identities illegally and selling them in the dark market.
That's why I'd rather talk to the bounty manager personally in a video call but never provide my personal documents.

Do we have a bounty manager, that accepts video call to verify or accept your KYC, I Have not found a bounty campaign that does that, some KYC is done, in the websites, bounty manager has nothing to do with verification of bounty participants, they have different team that does that, it's really not recommended to use your main email this is to avoid so many spam email, anyway you can always report these emails.

There are so many participants in a campaign and maybe 100+ in altcoin campaigns. Don't expect manager will be willing to do video call with all of them. However if they suspects an issue, video call is the good solution.

[FlamingFingers]

It's madness that people give away their personal details for just a few worthless tokens, if they really want to make money a better option would be to sell their own ID on the dark web themselves

It's really so awkward to see people giving out their personal details for pennies,  lots of participants are not aware that their information is being sold on the dark web,  they are being carried away by the pennies that will be giving to them

Up till now people are still blindly giving out their details, because they are not aware of what is happening behind the scenes

[wwzsocki]

...Don't do it people. Don't be reckless with your documents. You don't know how valuable a genuine ID is and how easy it is to swap a picture.

...usually every KYC has a similar process and if we are sending the documents we have to trust the site, else do not use it...

That is why it is so hard to believe that people do it and trust such an airdrop or other giveaways with their documents when this service or website has no credibility or any verified identity.
I don't see any problem in sending KYC documents to Coinbase or Binance and that they are asking it in the first place.

I hope that these days people are much more aware of this problem and this is not so easy to convince them to share private information.
From comments in this thread, I assume that many people see the danger and finally start to care about their privacy and online safety.

[Velkro]

Never use your first email to sign up for a bounty or to airdrop (create a new special email for this purpose) and for sure don't share your scanned documents and selfies (KYC).

Agree 100%!!!
We are living in strange times, when people think privacy is worthless, they sharing every info they have about themselfs online for no specific or serious reason. It will change in time, but for now its beign used by criminals to rob houses, take bank credits on someone else details etc. I could eloborate for hours on that. All because people share their private data without thinking about consequences and they are huge. Its already too late for most and only after 2 more generations of not sharing data, 3rd generation will have again freedom of their data. Sad.

[wwzsocki]

Never use your first email to sign up for a bounty or to airdrop (create a new special email for this purpose) and for sure don't share your scanned documents and selfies (KYC).

Agree 100%!!!
We are living in strange times, when people think privacy is worthless, they sharing every info they have about themselfs online for no specific or serious reason. It will change in time, but for now its beign used by criminals to rob houses, take bank credits on someone else details etc. I could eloborate for hours on that. All because people share their private data without thinking about consequences and they are huge. Its already too late for most and only after 2 more generations of not sharing data, 3rd generation will have again freedom of their data. Sad.

Maybe I am a little older and that is why I care about my privacy and despite that Facebook and other social media boomed when I was 18 years old I have never shared even one private photo on social media platforms. Despite such a big success of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and others I always felt like something is not ok with sharing your hall live online.

Of course, I have accounts on all these platforms but always used fake names and fake photos. Used mainly for promotion and for my cryptocurrency advertisings.
I just knew that there is a catch and after 10 years we know what it was. Social media giants like Facebook have so much data on people that with use of them lately Brexit was accepted and politicians use it for elections and win of course.

https://www.google.com/search?q=brexit+facebook+cambridge+analytica&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjx1KfWmorlAhXQY1AKHXhQC-cQ1QIoA3oECAoQBA&biw=1680&bih=949

We have to take our privacy really seriously finally.

[wwzsocki]

It's really so awkward to see people giving out their personal details for pennies,  lots of participants are not aware that their information is being sold on the dark web...

That is why I created this thread and keep answering from time to time to bump it to the top and make again visible for a while to let another couple of newbies on Bitcintalk be able to read it.
I assume that more experienced members from this community know already about this and never share their documents with bounty or airdrops, especially full scans and this type of documents.

Luckily, lately, there are not so many lucrative airdrops and bounties are ending too slowly. Only a couple of high-quality campaigns are active and managed by good CMs.

I think threads like this changed the awareness of people and today it will be a lot harder for scammers to convince them to share KYC documents.
In the time of Hyip and FOMO in 2017, this was like a plague, but everything is slowly evolving and the cryptocurrencies world is changing.
For better I hope  .

[peter0425]

You Really give the best advice for all crypto people specially those who’s in investing because they are the main target of the scammers and hackers.
That’s why I’m lucky that my friend had already told me in my first days here to create another email just to use for all my crypto related businesses .
And I believe that people now are more mature to learn this,but ofcourse what you’ve done is a great Job for everyone’s to be alert about all of this issues.Thank you so much Mate..

[vlasrodz]

it is absolutely normal,. that we do not need to send our emails with payments cards or else to exchanges, forums, or any other websites

Every normal user have a special emails for this options

[DaftAjax]

it is absolutely normal,. that we do not need to send our emails with payments cards or else to exchanges, forums, or any other websites

Every normal user have a special emails for this options

Can we blame these people (?) No absolutely not.

The OP wanted to spread awareness on how to deal with it, especially in this forum(lots of scammers lurking about), you'd be surprised on how many people still don't have a clue about this (*cough* bounty hunters *cough*), and he has done a great job. Many veterans keep on creating/reminding every user to read guides/rules of the forum, they even share guides about things outside of the forum(such as this one), but still many ignore such effort.

It depends on your definition of "normal". But nevertheless, I agree every person should have different/seperate e-mail(s) for this.

[wildey]

You Really give the best advice for all crypto people specially those who’s in investing because they are the main target of the scammers and hackers.
That’s why I’m lucky that my friend had already told me in my first days here to create another email just to use for all my crypto related businesses .
And I believe that people now are more mature to learn this,but ofcourse what you’ve done is a great Job for everyone’s to be alert about all of this issues.Thank you so much Mate..

yes, i like that too. I often hear that people who are not responsible can sell our identity at a high price, but I never believed that because I never saw it. but this time is different. So far, I have tried not to give my KYC / primary email to people I just met. it's just that some projects sometimes really need it. so, willing or not, I need to give it in the hope that a person is a trustworthy person. maybe I need to train myself to research more deeply.

[desticy]

There are many ways of verifying the identity of a person. The ICO, bounty and airdrops are collecting the personal identities illegally and selling them in the dark market.
That's why I'd rather talk to the bounty manager personally in a video call but never provide my personal documents.

Do we have a bounty manager, that accepts video call to verify or accept your KYC, I Have not found a bounty campaign that does that, some KYC is done, in the websites, bounty manager has nothing to do with verification of bounty participants, they have different team that does that, it's really not recommended to use your main email this is to avoid so many spam email, anyway you can always report these emails.

Such cases did occur in some bounty companies. In my opinion, this is nonsense. Not only do you have to send your documents (or not yours) with selfies and personal data,
but also a video verification that confirms your identity.
And all for what? For the sake of a heap of coins, which in the end may cost nothing at all or turn out to be a scam. Take care of your documents.

[Drai]

This is the reason why some people procured fake documents and use them for KYC purposes and it all started during those ICO days, every shit project out there started demanding for KYC before they could allow you to invest and the funny part is that some of them don't even check the documents provided, there was a project that I mistakingly uploaded an unrelated picture as my KYC document and when I was still thinking if correcting the mistake, I got a mail from them that confirms that my KYC was approved and I am eligible to invest in the ICO.

[JeotQ]

I don't care at all, i can use any email i like for any airdrops or bounties and still i will be safe because
1. I don't click links through mails
2. I did not connect my emails to any valuable things like bank accounts or wallets or websites with money in them, the exchanges are i use mostly are dex like changelly or shapeshift

[masulum]

I don't care at all, i can use any email i like for any airdrops or bounties and still i will be safe because
1. I don't click links through mails
2. I did not connect my emails to any valuable things like bank accounts or wallets or websites with money in them, the exchanges are i use mostly are dex like changelly or shapeshift

LOL, I little confuse with your post, you say don't care, but not using email that connects with your asset. It's mean you are not using your first email to join airdrop and bounty.

First email same as primary email that used for something important in your digital life. If you don't care about OP, of course you will use your connected email with your asset (wallet, exchange, etc.). When you are not using this kind of email, it's mean you are already using secondary email. So, if something happens to this email, your asset still safe. And, your story same as what OP says "Don't use your first email"