Help to legitimize miner and investment

[Orogodongo]

Hello,
I need to find out if im beeing fooled and scammed or if im safe and nothing to worry about.
I was contacted by someone who apparently works with mining and asked if I would be interested in investing in the mining.
The wallet was made for me with a password that I changed after logging in and transferd the minimum investment fund of 500$ I was told that the earnings was 60$ a day for 30 days.
After 3 days, now 5 days ago the hash rate increased and I received a notification saying that I had earned much more because of increase in mining speed.
To be able to retrieve that amount earned in what looks to be a non spendable im now told I have to do a top up in the wallet of 15% of whats in the non spendable.
I'm trying to figure out if im beeing scammed or if this is legit. Thanks for any answers helping to clarify this situation.

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[TryNinja]

So you already sent him $500? Did you withdrawal anything? What is this wallet he made for you? Please give us as much information as you can (software names, screenshots, links, overview of the messages he sent you, etc...).

Honestly, it sounds like you already got scammed for $500 and now he wants to keep tricking you into giving him even more money. Invest $500 and get $60 a day? That's 12% a day or 720% a month. I can't see this existing.

[o_e_l_e_o]

You are being scammed.

This sounds like a scam I have seen someone post about on here before. The scammer creates a web wallet and imports an address that they own and control from another wallet in to this web wallet as "watch only". They then send you the credentials of the web wallet and tell you to change the password, tricking you in to thinking you control the address inside the wallet (but you don't, since the address is watch only). You then top up the watch only address thinking it is your address, when really you are just sending money to the scammer. The scammer can then add more money to the watch only address, fooling you in to thinking you have earned a profit, and encourage you to deposit more. They will repeat this as many times as they can until you figure out you are being scammed, at which point they simply move on to their next victim. You can still see all the funds in the watch only address, but there is no way for you to retrieve them.

[HCP]

DO NOT SEND ANY MORE MONEY ANYWHERE!

I concur. This is a total scam. You have already lost $500. You will not be able to recover the funds you have already sent as you have no access to the private keys (which is why it is "non spendable"). You can't "unlock" this wallet or the funds by sending more money.

In the future, NEVER let anyone create a wallet for you... changing a password means nothing if the other party has already had access to private keys/seeds and/or the wallet they give you is "watching only" or "non spendable"... your funds will NEVER be safe.

[Orogodongo]

Appreciate the feedback and information.
Everything seemed legit and i'm usually skeptical in these situations but i guess I've been fooled.
This person doing the alleged scamming reached out to me on Instagram, having a profile showing what looks like authentic pictures of mining hardware and him posing as person who has made gains because of bitcoin mining.
He's profile is #cryp_branco on instagram.
Anyhow the wallet was created through blockchain app, and given to me to take over with my own password, but he's explanation was that he had to make it so it could be connected to the antminer.
Here is a some information from our conversation:

The roi works with my miner and what I’m using rn is the bitfury b8 miner and innosilicon A9 Zmaster at 50000th/s which will generate up to $51/day and we cut $1 charge leaving you with $50 that’s why the minimum investment is $500
That’s with the minimum amount of $500 you earn 10% daily for 30days
That’s total ROI of $1500
When the wallet is funded and confirmed by the mining hardware ...you start receiving your 10% payout directly into your wallet.

Our Mining services are not for free,I richard Branco would be legally entitled to 15% of the investor’s total profit each month(total profit after the 1 month mining time).
Your investment has been successfully confirmed by the mining hardware
You will start receiving your payouts in the next 24 hours
That will be a profit of $60 daily

3-4 days later:

Our mining bandwidth increased due to increase in bitcoin value so there is a 2% bonus which is applicable to all investors who made recent top up to their investment and also investors who have up to a thousand dollar capital
You can increase your investment to benefit from our bonus starting from your tomorrow’s payout
Each funds you add up to your wallet is being recorded and added to the mining hardware. That means any funds you add to your investment right now will be summed up with your first investment which will also increase your daily earnings and gives you a benefit of extra 2% bonus
Your investment starts counting each time you make a top up that means your previous earnings that is the amount in your mining wallet right now will also be added to your new earnings after the top up is made

That means the period is extended for additional days due to the top up.

Anyhow
Now i'm in this and he's trying to convince me that its all safe and i would now only need to top up 15% of the gains from the "non-spendable" to retrieve the amount that apparently is in my favor with a bit coin address linked to my wallet which says non-spendable with funds approximately 5k worth of btc.
I'm starting to feel as if i'm scammed, but not sure since i have contacted another guy whom is portrayed by branco as an investor.
He's profile was shared to me by branco, and he looks like a straight up family guy serving in the army.
I wrote to him asking if he had experienced the same, and how its going for him.
He gives me an answer saying that he confirms the same situation has happened to him, and i should trust keeping my investment with branco.
Apparently he's been investing with for a while as he states the following -
By 10th of this month will make it 6 months of my investment with cryp branco. Your investment is safe with them.



Anyways,

[HCP]

....

Anyhow
Now i'm in this and he's trying to convince me that its all safe and i would now only need to top up 15% of the gains from the "non-spendable" to retrieve the amount that apparently is in my favor with a bit coin address linked to my wallet which says non-spendable with funds approximately 5k worth of btc.
I'm starting to feel as if i'm scammed, but not sure since i have contacted another guy whom is portrayed by branco as an investor.
He's profile was shared to me by branco, and he looks like a straight up family guy serving in the army.
I wrote to him asking if he had experienced the same, and how its going for him.
He gives me an answer saying that he confirms the same situation has happened to him, and i should trust keeping my investment with branco.
Apparently he's been investing with for a while as he states the following -
By 10th of this month will make it 6 months of my investment with cryp branco. Your investment is safe with them.

As before: IT IS A SCAM


Regardless of what this other "investor" is claiming, this scheme IS completely bogus and you have been scammed. Your money is gone, you will not be able to get it back.

I would recommend that you immediately cease communicating with both of these fraudsters (unless you are attempting to get information that might help identify who they really are so you can pass it to law enforcement). But in any event, you chances of recovering your $500 are pretty much zero.

[nc50lc]

The wallet was made for me with a password that I changed after logging in and transferd the minimum investment fund of 500$ I was told that the earnings was 60$ a day for 30 days.

Anyone can make a watch-only wallet by pasting an random bitcoin address from the internet.
In this case, they must have given you a watch-only wallet created from their own wallet's addresses which is in their control, they can take out the funds from it any time.

They only given you the watch-only wallet because they wan't you to have a "false sense of security" that you now got the wallet,
but you didn't, you're just "watching their wallet".

I was told that the earnings was 60$ a day for 30 days

The numbers don't add-up if you'll profit that much for a $500 "investment".

Miners can barely earn $1 a day per Antminer S17, minus the electricity bill.
For legit (but not profitable) mining contracts, it's usually $40-60+ for 1TH for 12 months (diff per cloud mining service), that's to cover the operating cost.

You'll rent hashrates and earn what it can; not invest bitcoins to cloud mining service and earn a specific amount.
A piece of advice: if you hear "invest" in crypto space, it's a scam 99% of the time.

[o_e_l_e_o]

Everything seemed legit.

If they didn't seem legit then they wouldn't be able to fool people. Don't fall for it.

This person doing the alleged scamming reached out to me on Instagram, having a profile showing what looks like authentic pictures of mining hardware and him posing as person who has made gains because of bitcoin mining.
He's profile is #cryp_branco on instagram.

The pictures are all stock images or stolen from elsewhere. For example, here are links to the pictures of "his" mining equipment he stole from elsewhere:
https://picsart.com/i/image-crypto-310042111186201
https://www.pictosee.com/p/2126765626759475479

The pictures of himself seem to be stolen from a guy called "Gray Smith" - https://www.picuki.com/profile/iam_graysmith

Anyhow the wallet was created through blockchain app, and given to me to take over with my own password, but he's explanation was that he had to make it so it could be connected to the antminer.

Yup, this is identical to the scam I have seen before which I described above.

The roi works with my miner and what I’m using rn is the bitfury b8 miner and innosilicon A9 Zmaster at 50000th/s which will generate up to $51/day and we cut $1 charge leaving you with $50 that’s why the minimum investment is $500

Think about this. If he can generate $50 a day, then why does he need you to give him $500? He cant just wait 10 days and have the money himself, and then he can generate much larger profits than a measly $1 a day for himself. This makes no sense.

That’s with the minimum amount of $500 you earn 10% daily for 30days

10% daily for 30 days works out at over 1700% a month. This is utterly ridiculous.

Now i'm in this and he's trying to convince me that its all safe

Of course he's going to say that. He's trying to scam you out of as much money as possible. It's much more time efficient from a scammer's point of view to squeeze a single victim as much as possible than it is to go searching for new victims.

I'm starting to feel as if i'm scammed, but not sure since i have contacted another guy whom is portrayed by branco as an investor.

As above. It is completely trivial to create a fake Facebook/Instagram/Twitter/whatever profile with stolen photos. Even if he gave you links to a thousand "happy investors" it means less than nothing.


If for some reason you still don't believe you are being scammed, tell him you want to withdraw all your money and see what happens.

[Lucius]

People who do not understand even the most basic concepts of Bitcoin, which includes the creation of wallets, private/public keys, and that BTC mining is profitable only for big players, should not invest in anything related to crypto. Also, what to say about the state of mind of someone who believes a total stranger on social network?

Classic scam, nothing more than that.

[Orogodongo]

Thanks everybody for responding with information.
It turns out it was ponzi scheme and i was scammed.
Fortunately lesson is learned although it could have been avoided if i had taken the time to check it out and investigate some more beforehand.

[OgNasty]

Thanks everybody for responding with information.
It turns out it was ponzi scheme and i was scammed.
Fortunately lesson is learned although it could have been avoided if i had taken the time to check it out and investigate some more beforehand.

Think about what is probably the most popular investment in the world, the S&P 500. You can expect to see a return of around 2% per year (excluding free market price movements, i.e. capital gains). If someone is promising you more than 2% per year, there are likely extremely high risks involved. The return you were being promised would be impossible for anyone to offer.

[Telly16]

Can I take the opportunity to enquire about my case as well? I've tried to put a post on this but apparently it was deleted (no idea why).

Back in November I got in an investment which seemed very reliable. Had known 2 sources who talked really well about this guy and got to start in the Bitcoin through him.
He introduced himself as a trader from  a deep web platform who can actually get me 60-70% returns on his trading.
I went in with 1000US$ and had to upgrade my account and spent a considerable amount so far and still haven't seen any money back.
From what this guy says, there are procedures that the platform take which involves payment of taxes for you to actually get the first withdrawal in hand. I've had enough from them and I'm still trying to get the rules and regulations of this platform so I can close the account. But I can't find any information on the guy or this platform.

Please, can anyone help me out? I can even DM if required to investigate the legitimacy of all this stuff but I'm kinda desperate...

[Pmalek]

From what this guy says, there are procedures that the platform take which involves payment of taxes for you to actually get the first withdrawal in hand.

Let me guess, he will provide you with an address where you need to pay the "taxes"?
That sounds very much like a scam. Where did you find this guy and who told you to use his services? Where the two people you mentioned from this forum?
No legit investor will promise such returns. Make a proper scam accusation if you have proof to support your claim.
 

[o_e_l_e_o]

Back in November I got in an investment which seemed very reliable. Had known 2 sources who talked really well about this guy and got to start in the Bitcoin through him.

Both "sources" are working with the scammer to lure in victims.

He introduced himself as a trader from  a deep web platform who can actually get me 60-70% returns on his trading.

No, he can't. Or at least, not guaranteed and not without a very high risk of going bust.

I went in with 1000US$ and had to upgrade my account and spent a considerable amount so far and still haven't seen any money back.
From what this guy says, there are procedures that the platform take which involves payment of taxes for you to actually get the first withdrawal in hand.

Asking you to deposit more to upgrade your account, to unlock additional features, to increase your percentage, to pay taxes or fees, or any other reason is a common technique of scammers. Anything to get you to deposit more money.

You are 100% being scammed. Do not send them any more money or any personal details.

[HCP]

I went in with 1000US$ and had to upgrade my account and spent a considerable amount so far and still haven't seen any money back.
From what this guy says, there are procedures that the platform take which involves payment of taxes for you to actually get the first withdrawal in hand. I've had enough from them and I'm still trying to get the rules and regulations of this platform so I can close the account. But I can't find any information on the guy or this platform.

So, you've given money to someone for an "account on a platform" that you can't actually access?

You are 110% being scammed and have been from the start.

Had known 2 sources who talked really well about this guy and got to start in the Bitcoin through him.

Who are these 2 sources? Do they have accounts on Bitcointalk?

He introduced himself as a trader from  a deep web platform who can actually get me 60-70% returns on his trading.

To paraphrase the well known quote... "Greed cometh before the fall"... 60-70% returns? That is just ludicrous... there is another well known saying "If it looks too good to be true, it probably is".

At this point, you need to accept that your money is gone and you're not going to get it back. Whatever you do, DON'T send these people any more money.

[Telly16]

So, there is a platform which is in the deep web, I do have access to the platform and there are many procedures that seem legit. That's why I'm in doubt and wanted to know if there is any way to discover if this platform is safe.
The last thing requested by them, was to have an account with blockchain.com with a minimum amount of 3.141887 BTC in balance and after I do this I can actually withdraw my balance, since the blockchain wallet will have a 'Cryptographical Identity Verification' on the Exchange Platform which will link my blockchain wallet to the platform and these funds will be made available to me.
So the real question is: Is there a way to know is these guys are legit since the platform for trading is done in the deep web?

[o_e_l_e_o]

The last thing requested by them, was to have an account with blockchain.com with a minimum amount of 3.141887 BTC in balance and after I do this I can actually withdraw my balance, since the blockchain wallet will have a 'Cryptographical Identity Verification' on the Exchange Platform which will link my blockchain wallet to the platform and these funds will be made available to me.

Again - you are being scammed. There is no question about this. Stop sending them money.

There is no such thing as a "cryptographic identity verification", and there is no way to link a blockchain.com wallet with an exchange platform. There is no reason that you need to deposit bitcoin first or have a certain balance before you are allowed to withdraw. They are simply trying to get you to deposit as much as possible before you finally realize it is a scam.

If you still doubt this is scam, ask them now to return all the money you have so far deposited and see what they say.

[HCP]

The last thing requested by them, was to have an account with blockchain.com with a minimum amount of 3.141887 BTC in balance and after I do this I can actually withdraw my balance,

This account on blockchain.com was not created by you was it? They created it for you and then gave you the username and password (or they told you to set one up, and then import an address)... correct?


The whole "needing to deposit to be able to withdraw" is one of the oldest entries in the crypto-scammers playbook

I am fairly confident in making the assertion that this is 1000% a scam. DO NOT put any more money into this ridiculous scheme. Whatever you have already "invested" is lost... you're not getting it back. Walk away now.

[Telly16]

Guys, I haven't sent any money to them anymore and I highly appreciate your concern and replies to warn me this is a scam. What keeps bothering me is that no one was able to find a way to discover if this platform and this trader are legit or not.
I don't want to publish their names here, but I think it's really important this doesn't happen to anyone else and if possible to shut them down.
Since I'm still in touch with the trader and prefer not to put this information public, I'd really appreciate if someone could reach out to me through a DM, so I can really discover about these guys. Again, I really appreciate anyone who's trying to help out on this.

[MingoZingo]

Hey man!

Exactly the same happened with me and cryp_branco did this. This son of a b**** scammed me for $5000. I payed the service fee and VAT from a fake e-mail he set up. I have contacted local police and given them evidence for this, but I dont think he will get caught sadly. This guy I think he also gave the company website (but maybe fake) : crypto-hub.net   I reccommend everybody to report this guy, he has an open instagram user and get rid of this idiot. I have been in such pain for 2-3 weeks, even in my exams period as a student. I am really dissapointed and I feel terrible for the time being. I planned everything with the money he offered me, my future, and live a better life. I was so confident he wasnt a scammer until I found his e-mail was fake and he also sent me fake diplomas and verifications who were photoshopped. I really let myself down.