Bitcoin Scammer - a proposed resource for scam reports.

[Jet Cash]

Following on from my post in this thread - https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5180337.0 , I'd be intersted to hear if any members would be interested in working on a site like this. Considering the post by JackG, I think Drupal might be the best content management system, and this would allow for moderated comments by the general public. Whilst Bitcoin Talk would be the best place for this information, many new crypto buyers may be put off by the complexity of the forum. A simple scam reference directory could help them to determine their crypto purchases, and could also act as a recruiting ground for Bitcoin Talk.

I would be grateful for comments about this project proposal, and if there is any interest, then I will install Drupal on the domain as a test.

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[hatshepsut93]

We already have trust system and flags, what's the point of a third party site for that? Sure, you can list scammers and phishing and stuff like that, but how many people will be aware of it and how many people would bother to check it before doing trades or clicking on links? And you'll need some very serious SEO if you want to see your site on the first page of Google results when people search for something that is also on your site - that would cost a lot of money.

Also, you would probably need to make a public API so that people can develop extensions that automatically warn users when they get near scammers on this forum or on the Internet, but then again, that's the point of trust system here, and as for the Internet, certain extensions and even browsers themselves warn people about suspicious resources, they just need to gather enough user reports.

[Jet Cash]

The idea was to warn people who aren't members of Bitcoin Talk. I think we should be trying to improve the reputation of Bitcoin. Many people still seem to think it is a tool for drug dealers, extortionists, and terrorists.  I think we should try to point out that other transferable assets have a greater use in illegal activities.

I've already got the domain name, and I can provide the hosting, so I thought it would be better to put it to some use rather than leaving it on a sales page. If it can be used to recruit some new members to Bitcoin Talk before they are scammed, then it will be serving a useful purpose.

[Vod]

I would be grateful for comments about this project proposal, and if there is any interest, then I will install Drupal on the domain as a test.

I used Drupal once.   Terrible experience with the GUI setup. 
But that was a decade ago...

The biggest problem you are going to have is getting the user base. 

[hatshepsut93]

The idea was to warn people who aren't members of Bitcoin Talk. I think we should be trying to improve the reputation of Bitcoin. Many people still seem to think it is a tool for drug dealers, extortionists, and terrorists.  I think we should try to point out that other transferable assets have a greater use in illegal activities.

Now I'm confused, in the original thread you said that it should be a directory of all Bitcoin scammers, but now you say it will be used to point out that other assets are used in scams more.  How will a database of scammers will improve the image of Bitcoin, especially if it will pop up on first page of google search - if anything, it will only add to the opinion that Bitcoin's ecosystem is full of scammers.

Also, how will your system work - will anyone be allowed to add alleged scammers to the list, or only some privileged users? Will there be any public voting?

[Jet Cash]

I was really looking for some feedback on the potential project. If I decide to use Drupal, it will be Drupal 8, and that contains a lot of great improvements to the CMS. Probably the best way to handle the site would be to have a few people that were able to create articles, and a general membership that could comment on the article. Anti-spam and moderation would require some thought.

Pointing out that Bitcoin is one of the safest ways to store wealth, provided one observes basic precautions, would help Bitcoin in my opinion. Also, if one can help a new crypto recruit to avoid being scammed, then one could prevent him from abandoning cypto as a result of his losses.

At this stage, I'm interested in any suggestions to use the name to help the forum. Failing that, I'll just put it up for sale on Sedo or some similar site.

[DarkDays]

You'll have significant issues gaining and retaining your user-base. Firstly, after people have read a scam report on your side, why would they bother coming back? Secondly, after people have posted their scam report, why would they come back? Unless you're targeting the unlucky few who tend to get scammed multiple times in a row, I fail to see how the site could pick up momentum.

In order to be successful, this site would need to be the first thing anybody checks before taking part in a deal. Getting to that stage without an absolutely monumental SEO effort would be a miracle.

Here's a simpler option: help newbies and those participating in deals understand the due diligence steps they should perform before transacting.

[Jet Cash]

Here's a simpler option: help newbies and those participating in deals understand the due diligence steps they should perform before transacting.

To a certain extent I agree, but I often see new members arriving and asking for help after they had been scammed. As I have the name anyway, I thought it would be handy to use it to see if I could help a few people. If it saves a couple of people from losing money it will be worth it in my opinion. As I stated, I wasn't looking for continuity of membership, but a way to promote Bitcoin and Bitcoin Talk.

[jackg]

Bitcoin is referred to as dark Web money already and the majority of people consider it something that is just used by scammers and drug dealers and we probably won't get away from that for many years anyway. Especially since wealthy people are sad they've missed the boat for not buying the coin when it was cheaper...

Jet cash does pretty well at getting search engine crawlers to find his sites normally but it is probably quite a big undertaking to try to get it to the top of Google/duckduck, not an unachievable one though.

[linenoise]

Listing scammers is a whack-a-mole approach and sadly most people scammed are the newbies to crypto who don't even know of this forum. Not to say something shouldn't be tried, but the suggestion to educate users may have better long term consequences. Also the negative trust system does label posts strongly to be careful so there is a basic system in place.

Look at the recent PlusToken scam, it ended up touching up to 1% of all bitcoin which is a huge scam. However the millions of people scammed were new to crypto, mostly talking into it via wechat, and were walked through how to buy in. Unfortunately nothing done on this site would have helped those hit by PlusToken.

[Jet Cash]

Well there is a minor advantage for me in running multiple related sites across a variety of hosting plans. It does help to drive traffic to the sites that either make me money, or serve various political purposes. This is the reason that I put together Bitcoin Tunes for example. I'm also a long term believer in Bitcoin as a store of wealth, and I would like to help people protect their investments. Scammers are around in all asset classes, and operate at all levels. One of the major shocking revelations recently was the discovery of fake gold bullion bars sold through the London Good Delivery List. These are high level transfers that are made between countries and other entities dealing in £billions. You can't keep these frauds out of Bitcoin, but one can help users to avoid the more obvious ones.

People are unbelievably stupid, and they still seem to fall for scams that offer returns of 10% per month or more. It is difficult to protect them, but the genuine new user who isn't sure about the difference between Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash for example, could benefit from some basic information. I think Bitcoin Talk can be a bit intimidating and confusing for a person who is new to crypto, so an introductory page could  help him to find his feet.

[hugeblack]

Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime

I think that instead of creating lists of scammers, which need to be constantly updated and sometimes scam can only be identified after it has occurred, teaching others how to identify scam or the risks to which a scam site is measured will be useful.

Bitcoin Scammer Quiz 

A site similar to these ideas:

 - Google Phishing Quiz
 - Binance Phishing Quiz

[Harlot]

The idea was to warn people who aren't members of Bitcoin Talk. I think we should be trying to improve the reputation of Bitcoin. Many people still seem to think it is a tool for drug dealers, extortionists, and terrorists.  I think we should try to point out that other transferable assets have a greater use in illegal activities.

Well if that is the case theymos and the mods hiding the trust scores for unregistered users would be useless in the forum since your website will be showing ecerything to them. I believe that the admins hid the trust scored for anonymous unregistered members so that their views won't be changed towards that user have a bad trust score. 

[jackg]

Well if that is the case theymos and the mods hiding the trust scores for unregistered users would be useless in the forum since your website will be showing ecerything to them. I believe that the admins hid the trust scored for anonymous unregistered members so that their views won't be changed towards that user have a bad trust score. 

You can publicly see trist scores on the bpip too so it won't have an affect on that. Also all you have to do is register an account to see trust. It's not like you have to advance in membership...


Also, I think the site would be better looking at scammer strategies than listing members because it's like trying to block trolls - they'll just keep coming back...

[Jet Cash]

Teach a man to fish, and he lies in a boat all day drinking beer. [/qoote]

I own BitcoinVirus.com as well. so I could probably get a bit of mileage by developing the pair. There is no such thing as a Bitcoin Virus as far as I know, but most people don't seem to realise this.

[eternalgloom]

I personally don't think it would be a bad idea to make this.
It's always good to have a public record of what sorts of scams are floating around.

I'd be willing to write a couple of articles and add scams whenever I see a new one pop up.

[AdolfinWolf]

I personally don't think it would be a bad idea to make this.
It's always good to have a public record of what sorts of scams are floating around.

I'd be willing to write a couple of articles and add scams whenever I see a new one pop up.

I think a site with infamous scammers and detailed reports as to how they would scam you, (eg clipboard attacks, the electrum popup attacks, but also more pure social engineering and or things such as chargebacks) could be useful and pretty interesting to a lot of newbies. Wrap it in a nice blog/documentation format and i could see such a project become self-sustainable...

Especially something with a timeline and history of big scammers would (for me personally) be pretty interesting to give a read. At that point it does become more journalism than documentation though.

But... As others have already said;
You can already see it on this forum. People tend to simply not read the pinned/PSA threads. The incentive to go to a third party website and actually read a couple articles about certain methods might be even lower for a lot of users. I don't know.. The userbase which would fall for such scams would probably not be interested in reading a whole lot about it.

[eternalgloom]

@AdolfinWolf

Sure, you can already see this on the forum, but that isn't a reason to not start your own website.
The forum is very limited in its capabilities and I've heard many times that people don't tend to read it because this forum just seems to be from another age. (the UI is pretty dated...)

On a dedicated website you could have all the info in one place, together with articles that arm people against scammers.
I think that's a good idea, you can't have enough reputable websites that analyse and prevent scams IMO.

Plus, I really can't be bothered to write a good blog post on here, I'd rather have it published on an actual website.
Most writers would frown upon writing blog posts on a forum I think.

[jackg]

@AdolfinWolf

Sure, you can already see this on the forum, but that isn't a reason to not start your own website.
The forum is very limited in its capabilities and I've heard many times that people don't tend to read it because this forum just seems to be from another age. (the UI is pretty dated...)

I think the other thing is that a website looks a lot more distinguished than a forum, everyone can post on this forum only one person can own bitcoin scammer. Com for example so it makes it a bit more authoritative.



Things like watching only scams and phishing attacks got a lot of people and people go to different places to find out things. Some might come here some might go to a website/search engine.

Most posts in scam accusations will reach the second or third pages pretty quickly and just keep falling from there too...

[eternalgloom]

I think the other thing is that a website looks a lot more distinguished than a forum, everyone can post on this forum only one person can own bitcoin scammer. Com for example so it makes it a bit more authoritative.

Good point actually.

Like, there's also some incentive for me to write an article on a website versus on a forum.
I can't really use a forum post as part of my portfolio, while I could definitely use an article on Jet Cash's future website for that purpose.

Don't get me wrong, I don't mind writing for free, but it's always nice when you can use that content to basically prove your worth.
A forum post doesn't quite accomplish that goal