Crypto giveaway scams and how to spot them

[Altcoin76]

Cryptocurrency giveaway scams have been a problem for those involved in the crypto-community since the last major bull run in late 2017. Whether you’re a seasoned investor or just beginning to get your feet wet in the crypto-space, we encourage all of our customers to educate themselves on current cryptocurrency related scams and how to identify them. In this article, we’ll cover an increasingly common technique used by online scammers — the giveaway scam.



In a nutshell, giveaway scams are a form of social engineering in which a scammer attempts to deceive a cryptocurrency investor into believing that a major cryptocurrency exchange or celebrity is hosting a giveaway. The catch here is that in order to participate in the giveaway, you must first send a certain amount of cryptocurrency to a giveaway address so that you can verify your wallet address and receive your share of the giveaway. However, because cryptocurrency transactions are irreversible, once a victim sends money to the scammer’s address, there is nothing anyone can do to get it back and the scammer has made a profit.


Now that you understand the gist of what giveaway scams are all about, we’d like to make it extremely clear that Coinbase does not engage in cryptocurrency giveaways of any kind, however you can earn cryptocurrency by learning about them through Coinbase Earn. With that said, let’s move on to some recent trends.
Recent Giveaway Scam Trends

To help you recognize the signs of a giveaway scam, we’ve provided you with some examples of the most common giveaway scam trends being used to target cryptocurrency investors.

Coinbase Twitter Impersonations

In the screenshot below, we have a Twitter account impersonating Coinbase and replying to a legitimate Coinbase tweet with an image promoting a 5,000 BTC giveaway scam.



Twitter account impersonating Coinbase and responding to a legitimate Coinbase tweet with giveaway scam link.
The link in this image directs to a web page which would ask you to verify your Bitcoin address by sending anywhere from 0.1 to 10 BTC to the scammer’s giveaway address. According to the scammer’s web page, you would get x10 your payment back. This all sounds very good, but it is 100% a scam and you will receive 0 BTC back!




Celebrity Twitter Impersonations

In this example, we have a very normal looking Twitter account replying to a tweet made by Senator Bernie Sanders. The response here is thanking Elon Musk and sharing an image that appears to be a tweet from Elon Musk about a Bitcoin and Ethereum giveaway being hosted by Tesla. In actuality, this image was manipulated to appear like Elon Musk made this tweet and is purely manufactured by a scammer.



Fake Twitter account replying to a popular post with manipulated Elon Musk tweet.
Navigating to the link in the scammer’s image lands us on a web page that appears to be a Medium blog post. Within the post there are two “official” links leading to “free” Bitcoin and Ethereum. Both of these links lead to scam giveaway addresses that are not to be trusted no matter how great and well designed the web page looks.





Web page created to look like an original Medium blog post with links to giveaway scam.



Tesla giveaway scam page with scammer’s payment address.



YouTube Live Streams


This is a fairly new technique that scammers have been using to perpetuate their cryptocurrency giveaway scams. In this example, the scammer will create a YouTube video using older video streams of cryptocurrency exchange CEOs and overlay the video with some details about an alleged giveaway. They will also set up the video as a live stream so that it appears to be something that is happening NOW, further enticing viewers to participate in the giveaway immediately. In the video description, there is often an “official” giveaway address or a link to a web page containing the giveaway address. Additionally, the scammer will drive fake viewers to the video to make it seem like they have thousands of viewers at that very moment. Don’t fall for this scam, it’s a trap and you will not receive any free BTC!


YouTube account impersonating Coinbase and live streaming a dated ask me anything (AMA) video with Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong.



Giveaway Scam Email


In our final example, we have an attempt to promote a giveaway scam via email. In the email, the scammer is attempting to convince the recipient that Coinbase is hosting a giveaway to celebrate a user sign up milestone. As previously mentioned, Coinbase does not partake in any cryptocurrency giveaways. Therefore, this is a scam!


Giveaway scam lure sent via email.



Protecting your investment and fellow investors
Now that you’ve learned about the latest techniques being used by giveaway scammers, there are two simple rules that we’d like you to remember that should help you avoid scams like these in the future:
If it sounds too good to be true, it almost certainly is.
Think twice before sending your funds. All cryptocurrency transactions are irreversible and you will not be able to get your money back.
Lastly, if you encounter any giveaway scams like the ones shown above, please take a moment to protect the broader cryptocurrency community by reporting the scam to Coinbase or directly to Twitter, YouTube, or Google. For your reference, we’ve provided information on reporting to each entity below.

[Rodeo02]

Its easy to determine if a giveaway is legit or not. If the giveaway asking to transfer a money before participating then its abvious scam attempt .

Another things is if a giveaway is giving a high return from the asked amount you need to deposit then its the same.

This kind of scheme is not only happening in twitter its also use in other social media such as facebook youtube and telegram.

[Furryball]

One thing is certain here, in every fake or scam giveaways you will surely be asked to make a deposit of an amount to a address either in ETH or BTC, giveaways are giveaways, no strings attached, once a giveaway turns to deposit first it's surely a scam

[ukon]

Whatever it is related to having to deposit first to take part in the Giveaway I think it's clearly a fraud and has happened a lot in some other social media, the scamer continues to convince the victim to make a deposit first with the lure of a big reward even though with a scheme like I think it makes no sense and invalid.

The important thing is we have to be able to differentiate and not be tempted by large amounts of giveaway let alone have to deposit first.

[TanakabZX]

Scam giveaways always looks good in the eye, meaning they have too good to be real offers and secondly it will always end in the process of asking participants to make a deposit first, it's no more a giveaway if you are asked to make a deposit

[rhomelmabini]

If they asked for a deposit little or not, don't fall for it. If there are legit giveaways right now for sure those aren't that big that you can make a fortune out of it, it's just a penny. To get some legit giveaways better to go on to their legitimate sites then search if they really do such giveaways, live streaming giveaways AFAIK if involves crypto are all just ended a scam I haven't find that most of them are legit especially those that are done on YouTube.

You can give here the sites that have does this scam giveaways so that people will be aware of what really are these sites and if this hasn't reported yet and still lurking in the net then others may report it but utilized it by using the "code" bbcode syntax so it wouldn't be clickable by anyone.

[joseyphil82]

Honestly gone are those days where you can make life changing profits from giveaways but now it doesn't count anymore, they are always in pennies so why the stress? Giveaways that have high rewards are always very tasking, no such thing called free money, you either sweat for it or steal it

[leea-1334]

It is a giveaway. Enough said,,, consider it a scam because nothing on this beautiful earth is free. Even the legit airdrops never needed you to do anything that to claim the free stuff with a Bitcoin address or simply even airdropped onto your ETH wallet. And those are worth next to zero these days. Consider everything free a scam unless disproven.

[Novatech8]

Twitter is the home based of fake giveaways, I like myself because I only join Airdrops that are trading on exchanges, most giveaways aren't worth your time and effort, bounties are almost the same but once in a while bounty pays

[Raflesia]

Giveaway like this is rife and even they themselves are manipulating the giveaway transaction. I don't think if anyone is affected by this scamer, it is clear that this scheme is far from legitimate so it should be avoided even without knowing it.

Look for an airdrop / giveaway that is valid without having to deposit it first, no problem, even if a small nominal is important.

[Bonwin]

Most giveaway has a motive and most of the times, the motives are wrong. So, it is better to just ignore it. Most times, when I check my mail, I discover that it would have been flooded with scam messages. Despite being careful these days f whom to submit my email address to, it still seems unavoidable. This might be because I had given my address out to them in the past and the resultant effect is what I am now seeing.

[plvbob0070]

Its easy to determine if a giveaway is legit or not. If the giveaway asking to transfer a money before participating then its abvious scam attempt .

This is the most cases of scam nowadays like they want the user to send first their money before they give the airdrop or giveaway. You can definitely see this kind of giveaway scam on twitter and telegram, then I guess there's someone who still falls on this especially the newbie who just enters on this field. I know there's some legit giveaway but in order to obtain the prize, you need to do something like in Binance exchange where they launch community giveaway then you just need to trade 1 bitcoin before you become part of the giveaway.

If you see this kind of giveaway I suggest that you should avoid it because you're just wasting your money and time. Then, if you're going to participate in some giveaway make sure it is legit and not a scam. Always remember to make your research so can know what to do if you encounter this kind of scam.

[VDraci]

I like participating in airdrops, honestly they have safe me few times when I need some money, this makes me very good at picking solid airdrops and giveaways, kucoin giveaways are the most trusted ones if you can check that out, they never failed to pay

[fortunecrypto]

I like participating in airdrops, honestly they have safe me few times when I need some money, this makes me very good at picking solid airdrops and giveaways, kucoin giveaways are the most trusted ones if you can check that out, they never failed to pay

I agree that Kucoin airdrops are legit and can be trusted, all the others are questionable, there are so many giveaways and airdrops are to good to be true, and if an airdrop or giveaways are asking for payment then you have something to think about, because an airdrop is an airdrop and a giveaway is a giveaway there should be no fee involve.

[Greatchu]

It's very easy to detect scam Airdrops and give aways, of cos it depends on ones self, If you can control your greed you will never be scam by this cheap tricks, every Airdrops that ask for deposits are obviously a scam, it's that simple

[MOProgress]

The truth about scam project is that, in any business in life, people will tend to scam others, secondly, these days, it's not easy to spot scam projects, because they evn look more original that those real projects.

[ife2020]

I have other thoughts, instead of worrying about how to spot crypto giveaway coins around the globe, why not just avoid crypto giveaways. ?

Crypto giveaway scams are mainly to attract the greedy ones in crypto, because on normal terms, we should know that to earn free tokens, we must never pay or send private keys in return.

I reiterate that the final solution crypto giveaways scam, is total avoidance of giveaways by individual.

[Winscosinally]

Yes the best solution is to ignore giveaways, if you don't like bounties too just stay away from them, very simple I guess, I am into giveaways and bounties because I'm not scared of failures, I promote many projects and I never get paid but still I don't stop

[Altcoin76]

The truth about scam project is that, in any business in life, people will tend to scam others, secondly, these days, it's not easy to spot scam projects, because they evn look more original that those real projects.

Thank You Sir This Is My Responsibility To Aware New Comers To Crypto Field . The Thing Which Happens To Me When I Was New To Crypto Never Happen To Any Newcomers .

[danherbias07]

I hear this a lot.
"Once it is too good to be true then it might be a scam."
Just don't believe it.
Do not even take another step into what they are offering. Not even signing up to anything. That means hack if not scam.
Can also start a phishing technique.

I would rather go making efforts into joining bounties rather than believing this rotten events.