[LIST] ANN threads that are using bumping services

[Rikafip]

You can add the following ANN thread to your list.
[ANN][TGE][AIRDROP] Sylo - decentralised communication network and ecosystem

Good finding, SYLO has been obviously shilled by those accounts you mentioned.There is some big gap in thread activity from July 2019 up until June 2020, but only recent.ly they decided to rehire shills to hype this shitcoin. It's interesting coincidence that June 2020 was exactly the time when their token reached ATH and since then it lost its value by more than 80%.

Beside Sylo, one more ANN has been added to the list. Rubic shilling started recently, and while they are mostly using new accounts (well made in 2019/early 2020 but with no prior activity) few of them are also active in another ANN that is on the list already (Totem).
🎲 Rubic 🎲 Multichain DeFi platform

[Rikafip]

One more ANN thread added to the list

[ANN] Cryptoenter - THE WORLD'S FIRST DEFI SERVICE ON THE ENTERPRISE BLOCKCHAIN!
Bunch of newbie accounts that were made in 2018/2019 and had no prior post history suddenly woke up and decided to write exclusively in Cryptoenter thread, doing most basic shilling, writing one liners and pretending to be interested. It still baffles me how those "marketing services" manage to sell that to projects, don;t they see how fake that looks? Or maybe they are aware but simply don't care as  they want is to increase score in equally pointless and useless ICO tracking sites.

[Rikafip]

Two new additions to the list

[Ann] ⭐️ XENIUMX ⭐️ ⚡ Digital Asset eCommerce Token ⚡ ⭐️
Beside hiring sock puppet accounts to fake the interest, XeniumX also completely plagiarized whitepaper of another project and is a work of a known and serial scammer Laurie Suarez. You can read more about it in scam accusation thread.


xpocket - The one-stop solution for your crypto assets
XPocket is just another shitty DeFi that hired the same newbie accounts as above mentioned XeniumX. THose accounts are working exclusively in those two threads, and nowhere else. Another "coincidence" is that all those accounts are created in the last few days/weeks.

[DaveF]

As I posted above I do tend to stay out of the Alts / tokens except for a few here and there.
But while sitting on hold I saw this thread and spent some time wandering around in there.
Wow, what a dumpster fire.

Looking at the bumps that these coins are getting I actually see them driving people away they are so bad.
Seriously, the crap that is being posted for no reason, since alt announcements are now sorted differently I just don't get.

Do they just not know?
Hell I'm surprised that members with bump power are not getting PMs all over the place offering BTC to bump their threads.

Sorry for the interruption of the thread, just has to vent a bit.

-Dave

[Rikafip]

Looking at the bumps that these coins are getting I actually see them driving people away they are so bad.
Seriously, the crap that is being posted for no reason, since alt announcements are now sorted differently I just don't get.

Do they just not know?

That is the question I often ask myself, don't they realize how bad it looks when you see bunch of newbie accounts writing mostly one liners and why would anyone pay for something like that when it won't even push the thread at the top of the board like it used to.

Kudos to "marketing agencies" that still manage to sell that, I would really like to hear the tactic. My guess is that they count on ignorance of those that are hiring them, as majority of them never visited bitcontalk before so they don't really know how things are done here, and how hiring shill service is perceived. They probably tell them "everyone is doing that" or "there is so much traffic on bitcointalk that this is the only way to stand out from others", or something along those lines.

Another thing they might use to sell this service is the fact that at least 2 ICO trackers that I know of are giving ratings based on bitcointalk ANN activities (ICObench and Foundico). Again, everyone that is long enough in crypto knows that those ICO tracking sites and ratings there are irrelevant, but I guess newbies don't know that, so yet again they count on ignorance.

Hell I'm surprised that members with bump power are not getting PMs all over the place offering BTC to bump their threads.

I would be surprised if that is not already happening, but maybe in a more discrete way. If something can be abused and monetized, most likely it will.

[DaveF]

Hell I'm surprised that members with bump power are not getting PMs all over the place offering BTC to bump their threads.

I would be surprised if that is not already happening, but maybe in a more discrete way. If something can be abused and monetized, most likely it will.

Guess nobody loves me enough to offer me BTC to hit the bump button.
But, seriously you are correct in the fact that there are people here with a high enough rating that have good bump power who would not think twice about using it for pay.
Others might but would probably charge more then most of these people are willing to pay.

Some might come running out to say "project x offered me BTC to bump their posts"
However, the people who read those ICO / Token / type posts probably don't read much else on this board so it really would not matter.
And if they are smart they do it anonymously. So you have plausible deniability.

In your research have you found how much these bumping / marketing agencies charge?

-Dave

[Rikafip]

In your research have you found how much these bumping / marketing agencies charge?

Somehow I never thought of asking how much exactly do those "marketing agencies" charge when few admitted of hiring them, but there is one source that can give us some ballpark figure.

Some time ago @nutildah identified probably the biggest bumping service on the forum, Vitor Services. In that thread you can see that they offer various packages, from 390 USD per month up to 1490 USD per month. In that cheapest package you get: 500 telegram members, 150 comments in telegram group and 100+ ANN thread comments. If they charge let's say half of that for only ANN thread comments, that's still decent amount of money for such a crappy job they are doing. 100 posts per month would make an average of approximately 3 posts per day, and from my experience frequency of those posts is much higher, so more expensive packages are probably more popular.

I called them probably the biggest group as I think that they are responsible for at least 50% of all bumping spam on the forum, and that is conservative estimate. If you dig deep enough you can connect their accounts to almost every newly added ANN on the list. They also like to use old newbie accounts made years ago, that's one of their "trademarks".

[DaveF]

$1500 a month for that kind of crap-show?
Wow, time to change my line of work.

If the posts al least did not totally suck OR if there were some users with some kind of quality behind them it would be different.
You would think that for that kind of money they could buy a few decent accounts to give some things some form of legitimacy.
But, I guess in the end it's just scammers scamming the scammers.

Merry Christmas.

-Dave

[notblox1]

There are also people selling bump services very cheap on fiverr and other websites like that for few dollars, and with multiple accounts it is not so hard for anyone to do that because they don't need any higher ranked accounts for that.
Vitor services is next level stuff

[Rikafip]

You would think that for that kind of money they could buy a few decent accounts to give some things some form of legitimacy.

I have some doubts about certain group of higher ranked accounts being part of a more serious  bumping group that is doing that in a much better way than Vitor Services and similar spammers, but it is not easy to connect all the dots and say with 100% certainty who is part of the group and who is not.

But, I guess in the end it's just scammers scamming the scammers.
Merry Christmas.

You summed it up nicely, in most cases it boils down to that, dodgy projects hiring dodgy service. And Merry Christmas to you too!

There are also people selling bump services very cheap on fiverr and other websites like that for few dollars, and with multiple accounts it is not so hard for anyone to do that because they don't need any higher ranked accounts for that.
Vitor services is next level stuff

I just checked fiverr, and it doesn't seem so cheap. I saw packages like 10 posts for 17 USD and for me that's pretty expensive considering the lack of quality. It makes more sense to run BTC signature campaign that hire those spammers.


One more announcement thread has been added

[ANN] Mirror Protocol Launch - Trade real-world assets with crypto now!
Same group of accounts that is working on xpocket and that scam XeniumX started working on the Mirror Protocol thread too. Since I tagged that group of accounts, as always they just activated another group of newbie accounts and continued in the same manner. Whack-a-mole goes on.

[LordShanken]

The thread is full of comments from users whose accounts were created probably just to talk only about this project.
I don't know if someone has purchased bumping service or creates these accounts by himself, but it looks quite suspicious: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5305207.0

[FatFork]

The thread is full of comments from users whose accounts were created probably just to talk only about this project.
I don't know if someone has purchased bumping service or creates these accounts by himself, but it looks quite suspicious: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5305207.0

You are absolutely right. @Rikafip, you can add this thread to the list.
A bunch of newbie accounts that have been dormant since 2019 to suddenly start bumping this topic. Definitely some form of paid bumping spam 'service'.

[ANN][DeFi] The fastest way to earn DeFi passive income.

[Rikafip]

The thread is full of comments from users whose accounts were created probably just to talk only about this project.
I don't know if someone has purchased bumping service or creates these accounts by himself, but it looks quite suspicious: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5305207.0

It indeed looks suspicious and upon checking their announcement thread and website I found the evidence of making commenting on Ann thread one of the requirements for their airdrop which is against the forum rules.

I reported the thread to moderators and hopefully it gets deleted soon.

[LordShanken]

The thread is full of comments from users whose accounts were created probably just to talk only about this project.
I don't know if someone has purchased bumping service or creates these accounts by himself, but it looks quite suspicious: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5305207.0

It indeed looks suspicious and upon checking their announcement thread and website I found the evidence of making commenting on Ann thread one of the requirements for their airdrop which is against the forum rules.

I reported the thread to moderators and hopefully it gets deleted soon.

All shady comments from their thread have been deleted.

Now I also noticed that they received an unnatural amount of positive feedback in the "Trust" section within a few days. In my opinion, leaving a positive "trust" is also one of the requirements in some airdrop or campaign they are running:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=trust;u=2109730

[Rikafip]

All shady comments from their thread have been deleted.

And the new ones keep appearing. I just don't understand why mods simply didn't delete/locked the thread as it is a a clear violation of bitcointalk rules, my report is still unhandled.

Specifically, you are not allowed to give people any incentive to post insubstantial posts in your threads. You can't offer to pay people who post their addresses, usernames, etc. You can do giveaways off-site and link to the giveaway page in a thread, but you can't give people any bonus for replying to your thread.

Similar threads are already restricted to Games and Rounds in the non-altcoin sections, but the giveaway-related post volume is so high in the altcoin sections that I've decided to just ban them entirely here.

Now I also noticed that they received an unnatural amount of positive feedback in the "Trust" section within a few days. In my opinion, leaving a positive "trust" is also one of the requirements in some airdrop or campaign they are running:

Yeah it is obviously connected to airdrop as same accounts that left comments on the thread also left positive trust feedbacks. If you check their website, you won't find that among the requirements so I guess they have at least that much brain not to ask for that openly but rather "under the table".

[bakasabo]

Hello Rikafip,

I think that [ANN] Workbit - Freelance platform belong to be in the list of using bumping service.

Topic is self-moderated, lots of old Newbie and Jr.Member accounts that started to post on January 4-5. They post only in this exact topic and create a conversation between each other. I've made a simple post with hint that might help project to improve, but it seems on purpose it was either ignored or got no reaction.

[Rikafip]

Hello Rikafip,

I think that [ANN] Workbit - Freelance platform belong to be in the list of using bumping service.

Topic is self-moderated, lots of old Newbie and Jr.Member accounts that started to post on January 4-5. They post only in this exact topic and create a conversation between each other. I've made a simple post with hint that might help project to improve, but it seems on purpose it was either ignored or got no reaction.

You are absolutely right, they indeed hired bumping service and by the looks of it, they hired most popular one, Vitor Services. All accounts are at least few years, some are even from 2011 (I still wonder how they have so many accounts from that early bitcointalk period) and they are currently active only in Workbit announcement thread. Standard Vitor Services M.O.

Workbit thread has been added to the list, making it 90th entry since I started eight months ago, and that's just those were identified and reported here, who knows how many more are still undetected.

[posi]

Hello Rikafip,

I think that [ANN] Workbit - Freelance platform belong to be in the list of using bumping service.

Topic is self-moderated, lots of old Newbie and Jr.Member accounts that started to post on January 4-5. They post only in this exact topic and create a conversation between each other. I've made a simple post with hint that might help project to improve, but it seems on purpose it was either ignored or got no reaction.

You are absolutely right, they indeed hired bumping service and by the looks of it, they hired most popular one, Vitor Services. All accounts are at least few years, some are even from 2011 (I still wonder how they have so many accounts from that early bitcointalk period) and they are currently active only in Workbit announcement thread. Standard Vitor Services M.O..

The ANN thread owner did do bumping services but it not mostly done by the Vitor Services cause some project owner do it by themselves, I an saying this cause I have seen a lot of fiveer users who offers services in selling forum account which I think they can easily buy and pump the ANN themselves, either way, it could the work of Vito but they are not always behind it.

[morvillz7z]

The 'workbit' thread is likely connected to the guys with malware wallets/fake miners, i mean it has to be one of theirs, all of the evidence leads to them.

Accounts peter054 and riefly have previously shilled in ZECZERO, their wallets were detected to be malware:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5282881.msg55407165#msg55407165

riefly's first shill post (after almost 3 years pause) is here:

Attention Please!!! These guys stole my profile and post this topic. Please be aware of this project don't believe them.

^someone had their account stolen and fake ann with malware wallets posted on their behalf.

Most of the accounts in workbit thread are old, as pointed above, accounts who have woken up around the same time have posted malware:

bbtou - is an active poster in workbit thread


Look what cdazzle, gunnit and merakesh have posted:
https://loyce.club/archive/posts/5601/56012436.html
https://loyce.club/archive/posts/5601/56012458.html
https://loyce.club/archive/posts/5601/56012472.html

One more example, capterra aged account shilling as well:


check out spaceman303 and bitcoinbroker's posts:
https://loyce.club/archive/posts/5602/56024524.html
https://loyce.club/archive/posts/5602/56024531.html

[Rikafip]

The ANN thread owner did do bumping services but it not mostly done by the Vitor Services cause some project owner do it by themselves, I an saying this cause I have seen a lot of fiveer users who offers services in selling forum account which I think they can easily buy and pump the ANN themselves, either way, it could the work of Vito but they are not always behind it.

Well of course they are not the only ones that are offering bumping, I know that there are many of them offering services via Fiverr, but somehow I doubt those have access to Newbie accounts made in 2011. When you look at these cases long enough you start noticing some patterns.  As I said, it looks like them but I can't be 100% sure that they are behind Upwork bumping but in the end it doesn't matter much who exactly is doing that.

The 'workbit' thread is likely connected to the guys with malware wallets/fake miners, i mean it has to be one of theirs, all of the evidence leads to them.

It's either them, or maybe they have the same account supplier. Someone had to think in advance and make all those accounts back in the early bitcointalk days and probably is selling them in bulk. Looks to me like they have unlimited amount of those old accounts as no matter how many of them get banned, new ones are constantly popping up.

But I think you are onto something here with Workbit-malware wallets connection  as I see Workbit ANN has been reported yesterday to have malware link so hopefully it gets deleted soon.


One more thread has been added to the list

[ANN] BUMO - Public Blockchain for Ubiquitous Value Transfer
Thread was created yestrday and almost immediately newbies started their work. Accounts used are also active on several other threads that are already on the list like Baex, Base Protocol, Investro, Totem etc.