How to collect forked coins without getting robbed

[ControlAltPete]

I got a call for help from someone who had tried to collect his Bitcoin Diamond forked coins, but instead got scammed out of $300,000 worth of Bitcoins. He had gone to electrumdiamond.org ( DON’T GO THERE ) and downloaded fake wallet software from GitHub. He entered his wallet recovery seed into the software ( NEVER DO THIS ) and the software used his recovery seed to steal all his Bitcoins. I wrote an article so people know how to safely collect their forked coins without this happening to them. Here is a link to the article:

http://www.petertheobald.com/tech/how-to-get-your-forking-money/

I'm not selling anything, just wrote it to help. If I had spoken to this guy before he got scammed this is what I would have told him. Feedback please if anybody finds this helpful.

[1714465822]

1714465822

[nc50lc]

Not helpful, at least here in Bitcoin Technical Support;
this should be moved to "Beginners and Help" as the victims of such obvious scams are usually newbies.

For reference, one of the official link to Electrum Diamond fork is in their own official website (https://www.bitcoindiamond.org/download/).
Before proceeding to claim your "forked coins", make sure to send your "real coins" to another wallet/address to minimize risks; the forked coins wont be affected by it.

[ControlAltPete]

Thanks, I was going to move it but I see you've already moved it to 'Beginners & Help'.

[JeromeTash]

Ooh i remember that infamous website (electrumdiamond.org). It hosted a fake wallet which was laced with Malware. Those people stole lots of money from people who were trying to claim forks.

One particular user i can not forget lost over $1Millon worth of crypto to the hacker behind that wallet: Read more details about the story in this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5080741.0

Members who knew about this incident tried report the malicious website but it remained online for a while but go thing it's offline now.

[pooya87]

If you are downloading and trusting a new software wallet it is essential that you first move your original Bitcoins out of the shared address, in case there is a trojan in the software.

it is not enough to just move your coins out of the "address" specially when you are using an HD wallet such as Electrum. you have to create an entirely new wallet with a new seed and move your bitcoins there and then import the seed into the fork coin's wallet.
you say this later one but there isn't enough emphasis on it, and this is a very important matter people forget.

[JeromeTash]

If you are downloading and trusting a new software wallet it is essential that you first move your original Bitcoins out of the shared address, in case there is a trojan in the software.

it is not enough to just move your coins out of the "address" specially when you are using an HD wallet such as Electrum. you have to create an entirely new wallet with a new seed and move your bitcoins there and then import the seed into the fork coin's wallet.
you say this later one but there isn't enough emphasis on it, and this is a very important matter people forget.

Actually moving coins to a new wallet would not help so long as you downloaded the Fake wallet and installed in on the same device. The Fake wallet hosted on the website was Malware itself. It would give the hacker a get way to the victims PC and then the attacker would start stealing the coins remotely without the victim's knowledge.

If you check the link to the thread i shared, the victim did not just lose only BTC, he lost even other altcoins

Yesterday in the very early hours of the morning Dec 4th I have been hacked and completely robbed out. The total of 1 Mio USD in different coins have been stolen from my system. I am still pissed off from my own shitty security. But things happened and I cannot go back in time.

Here ist the list coins and transactions of the robbery:

Date/Time          Currency Amount      Reference to Blockchain explorer    Destination address
04.12.18 00:31   DASH       9000         https://tinyurl.com/y8fpvxln          Xom6WhRTiAZhtiMzMQXCS4Aew1PB3v62Tb
04.12.18 00:36   BCH        613,291     https://tinyurl.com/yd2y3wdr        Qpx5pyy9catx7sluuyzqr03fw3c93ahwms2qfhnznx
04.12.18 01:12   BTC        2                 https://tinyurl.com/ybnrmvfq        1MBPQ445uL9kbUqq5abvcv2wdBgvjJ51KP
04.12.18 01:20   BTC        1,7            https://tinyurl.com/y8s4c7kc         1MBPQ445uL9kbUqq5abvcv2wdBgvjJ51KP
04.12.18 01:30   NEM        264992       https://tinyurl.com/ycr35va3          NBLI5G-ONLML2-5RY666-BQL2QS-IIMCJT-EUT5PJ-R7MF
04.12.18 02:14   BURST    7643993       https://tinyurl.com/yat7pjna          BURST-2WVC-EJXY-TMMW-2SQRW
04.12.18 12:42   BTC        1,840       https://tinyurl.com/ycknktjx           bc1qy8ypdjjqkh663j83k4zlv8cxw8nte08m042nxf
04.12.18 12:44   OmiseGo  2329,436  https://tinyurl.com/y9tuss5q          0xd26114cd6ee289accf82350c8d8487fedb8a0c07
04.12.18 12:45   LTC        117,602       https://tinyurl.com/y895dtvs         LhpfUpX32CTyd8MekNJkdXAX9BZYUzHNtW
04.12.18 12:48   BCH        5,899       https://tinyurl.com/ydctqokv         Qzhpt232rhktu2zzll55cf4vthyya8mtw5nsg9auu9
04.12.18 12:48   DASH       4,929      https://tinyurl.com/ya23s6y9          XerirSmDu9YjbdG641uNsg5tmnb2twvrgE

[pooya87]

If you are downloading and trusting a new software wallet it is essential that you first move your original Bitcoins out of the shared address, in case there is a trojan in the software.

it is not enough to just move your coins out of the "address" specially when you are using an HD wallet such as Electrum. you have to create an entirely new wallet with a new seed and move your bitcoins there and then import the seed into the fork coin's wallet.
you say this later one but there isn't enough emphasis on it, and this is a very important matter people forget.

Actually moving coins to a new wallet would not help so long as you downloaded the Fake wallet and installed in on the same device. The Fake wallet hosted on the website was Malware itself. It would give the hacker a get way to the victims PC and then the attacker would start stealing the coins remotely without the victim's knowledge.

that is a very good point
my automatic assumption was that the user is already running the wallet inside a sandbox which would isolate it from the main computer and the wallet(s) they may have. since this new software is either shady and without reviews to be trusted. for that i suggest using "virtualbox" (https://www.virtualbox.org/).

[joniboini]

Actually moving coins to a new wallet would not help so long as you downloaded the Fake wallet and installed in on the same device.

Running a malicious file or suspicious file should never be done in the main OS. At least use sandboxie to run it, or better, use a completely different computer.

[Lucius]

I got a call for help from someone who had tried to collect his Bitcoin Diamond forked coins, but instead got scammed out of $300,000 worth of Bitcoins.

$300 000 is currently worth around 31+BTC, and 31 BCD is worth $15.80. That person has shown an enviable level of unintelligence, stupidity, and ignorance. What to say when someone is risk $300k for $15+?

The golden rule when it comes to forked bitcoin shitcoins, before claim move coins to new wallet (not to new address) and then play with that private keys/seed. From example posted above, we can see that some fake wallets can contain very nasty malware, so only safe way before claims of forked coin is to move BTC to hardware/paper wallet, and thus completely disable access to hackers that in any way come into their possession.

[hugeblack]

This leads us to reaffirm, the fact that the program is open-source or that it exists on Github does not mean that it is safe, check the developer team, development plans and views of the community using decentralized forums.

The golden rule when it comes to forked bitcoin shitcoins,

The problem is that most beginners don't know how to do it, so they follow the instructions they get from the Internet (Google first page.)
Most of those forks are fake "official ones" or are exploited by scammers.

Many believe that to get new forked coins you must have active/real coins in your moment of the claim.

[bitmover]

As many mentioned , moving your BTC before claiming forks is the most important.
Then you have to worry about your forked coins, which can be robbed also. The best way is to download a good wallet
No doubt the best wallet to claim forks is Coinomi, as this wallet support almost all the forks that have any value. I am surprised no one mentioned it yet.

Use coinomi Mobile version, which is safer than the desktop version. Older and more established

[gentlemand]

Is claiming forks even still a thing?

Back in the day I waited for vaguely reputable multi coin wallets to emerge before claiming the major forks, or used exchanges. I let Kraken split my BSV for me. For the junky ones it no longer mattered whether someone got the keys as anything with value was long gone.

Anyone thinking of doing it should list the coins by order of value and start with the most valuable first. And of course there should be no proper BTC anywhere near that wallet before you start.

[ControlAltPete]

Thanks Pooya87, I've added this to the article:

The way to move your Bitcoin to safety is simple, just use your Bitcoin wallet software to transfer your Bitcoins out of the shared wallet right back to yourself at a new receive address in a new wallet. If there is one thing you get from this article it should be this: MOVE YOUR BITCOINS OUT OF THE ORIGINAL WALLET BEFORE ENTERING YOUR SEED OR KEYS ANYWHERE. Many people have been robbed of all of their Bitcoins by not doing this.

[LTU_btc]

$300 000 is currently worth around 31+BTC, and 31 BCD is worth $15.80. That person has shown an enviable level of unintelligence, stupidity, and ignorance. What to say when someone is risk $300k for $15+?

I agree. It just doesn't makes sense to risk so much to get $15. There is probably only one fork which is worth to claim - it's BCH. Other forks is just worthless coins in general and claiming them isn't worth hassle.
Moving your Bitcoin to new wallet before claiming fork is must do thing. Then your Bitcoins will be safe. Another important thing - not use random wallets to claim if you don't want to lose forked coins. Use wallets which are listed on official website of coin.

[Saint-loup]

Thanks Pooya87, I've added this to the article:

The way to move your Bitcoin to safety is simple, just use your Bitcoin wallet software to transfer your Bitcoins out of the shared wallet right back to yourself at a new receive address in a new wallet. If there is one thing you get from this article it should be this: MOVE YOUR BITCOINS OUT OF THE ORIGINAL WALLET BEFORE ENTERING YOUR SEED OR KEYS ANYWHERE. Many people have been robbed of all of their Bitcoins by not doing this.

You can also send your bitcoins to exchanges if they've announced offering the forked coins at the normal rate. But be careful it's the right rate. Bitfinex didn't offer BCH at the normal rate to its users for example