[click-bait] Should I start escrowing accounts?

[LoyceV]

First: This user was scammed by bitcointalk account seller (Deserve Tag?)

It's a bit of a click-bait title, but it's something that has been on my mind for a very long time.
I know account sales are heavily frowned upon, and buyers and sellers usually get tagged by one or more DT-members. I also know account sales still happen, and (at least 2 years ago) there was someone escrowing them.
I also know sold accounts have been used to spam and/or scam.

There are of course complications: the original owner can recover his lost accounts, or the seller might be selling a hacked account. All in all there are far too many risks involved for me to dare escrow accounts, but I hate seeing people get scammed by fake account sellers. Meanwhile, the account seller can use the risk of a red tag to make a potential buyer send him funds without escrow:

There's no one who escrows bitcointalk accounts without tagging them.. there is no security between myself and the buyer that my account won't be tagged...

Is this something we (as a community) can improve? A neutral tag "account changed hands at this date" would be great for transparency, but would instantly be followed by more red tags too.
How can we stop scammers from making a profit by pretending to sell accounts they don't have?

No spam please.
Self-moderated against spam and off-topic posts. You can find deleted posts here.
Discussion and questions are welcome.

[1715547469]

1715547469

[Coyster]

Okay, the first step imo, is to have a consensus on what should happen to an account that was sold, a negative or a neutral tag, if that is not addressed, then account buyers will continue to be scammed, and no reputable escrow will want to get involved, to provide transparency. If one is to escrow in the transfer of accounts for money, there is the risk of all parties, including the escrow himself getting tagged for aiding account sales. Is account sales against the rules, prolly no, will the buyer and seller get tagged, yes, 99% of the time.

It'll only be possible to escrow in account sales if it's no longer considered as red tag worthy, and then the buyers can obviously always openly seek for reputable escrows, as they and the account their planning on selling won't be tagged.

Edit:

Okay, the first step imo, is to have a consensus

With more than 500 DT-members, that's not going to happen. And even if all 500 would agree, new users are added to DT all the time.

If it's not, then all the escrow will be ensuring is that the account gets to the hands of the buyer, but when the community gets to know the account changed hands, it will face multiple tags, and the buyer I'm sure is obviously interested in joining bounties, which defeats that instantly. Another thing is if it can be escrowed in secret, without the community being aware, or we could just tell users not to buy accounts.

[LoyceV]

Okay, the first step imo, is to have a consensus

With more than 500 DT-members, that's not going to happen. And even if all 500 would agree, new users are added to DT all the time.

[Jawhead999]

IMO there's no problem if you want to escrowing account sales since you only want to make sure both of buyers and sellers is safe.

But, I don't think people will buy account with negative tagged from DT members... the purpose of buy account is to joining signature campaign or scamming. Or is there any other purpose?

Since using escrow will make his account get tagged, I think they will trade without using escrow... even it's not safe.

or we could just tell users not to buy accounts.

That will never stop, I believe we will see another victim got scammed

[Upgrade00]

Meanwhile, the account seller can use the risk of a red tag to make a potential buyer send him funds without escrow:

What's the buyer's motive of wanting to get a ranked account? And how does a tag limit them from achieving their objective? Shouldn't the risk of getting red tagged and potentially getting scammed discourage one from actually trying to buy an account?

Account sales is similar to a can of worms and any user willing to still jump through the hoops to buy one is probably trying to do something unethical with it. I highly doubt any trusted escrow provider would be willing to facilitate such a deal.
Imo there are two potential options;
• The admins outrightly banning account sales, so there's no ambiguity to the rules, or
• DTs reaching a consensus on the response to such cases.
With the diversity in the DT group, a consensus is unlikely. That leaves the first option. But that's up to the admins.

Is this something we (as a community) can improve?

It's not much, but tagging account sellers should serve as enough deterrent for those conscious of the forum to avoid trying to purchase one. However, not all sales can be accounted for however as some happen in private and off the forum.

[marlboroza]

How can we stop scammers from making a profit by pretending to sell accounts they don't have?

I am little confused here, you want to stop scammers by escrowing accounts to potential scammers and abusers?  

A neutral tag "account changed hands at this date" would be great for transparency

Probably no one will buy account knowing it will be marked as sold and even if they do:

but would instantly be followed by more red tags too.

...and maybe some flags too.

Okay, the first step imo, is to have a consensus on what should happen to an account that was sold, a negative or a neutral tag, if that is not addressed

What consensus? According to lauda, theymos said it is ok to flag sold accounts https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5197446.0.

[pokeronlinestatus]

I hate seeing people get scammed by fake account sellers.

Why you are worrying for the actual cancer cells of this forum like you mentioned:

I also know sold accounts have been used to spam and/or scam.

How can we stop scammers from making a profit by pretending to sell accounts they don't have?

Why should we stop?

In my eyes, the future scammer is getting scammed before they plan up (as per old saying scammer gets scammed).


If people come to know like there is no legit BTT account seller then they may not plan up ever for buying accounts to scam/spam.

Finally you sound like supporting future scammers and spammers by encouraging account buyers by escrowing through your well established account. Definitely NOT good for this community.

[Coin_trader]

How can we stop scammers from making a profit by pretending to sell accounts they don't have?

I am little confused here, you want to stop scammers by escrowing accounts to potential scammers and abusers?  

He made additional note to leave neutral feedback regarding user change hand. I believe this is sufficient tag to notify user that the account was not the original owner already. No one can stop this kind of scheme and some them are using shopify and playerup as safe platform for selling account.

I believe campaign abused is not a problem anymore because of the merit system and the competition in participating campaigns. Most of the bounty campaigns too are not paying anymore so buying account is not that profitable for abuser.


I disagree on interfering transaction of BTT accounts. We are just encouraging hackers to hack more dormant account and sell it here. Many buyer will be tempted to buy it since there will be a reliable escrow available in the forum. I saw many high rank account that being sold on some escrow platform in bundle and this transaction might move here once DT escrow step in.

[LoyceV]

I am little confused here, you want to stop scammers by escrowing accounts to potential scammers and abusers?  

Yes I want to stop scammers, no I don't want to escrow accounts to potential bad guys.

In my eyes, the future scammer is getting scammed before they plan up (as per old saying scammer gets scammed).

I don't think all account buyers will be future scammers (although we can't know upfront which path they'll take). There are currently still some good users around, who initially bought their account.
Each time a scamming account seller gets away with a profit, he'll be motivated to continue.

If people come to know like there is no legit BTT account seller then they may not plan up ever for buying accounts to scam/spam.

Unlikely. This has been going on for years, and I expect it to continue.

Finally you sound like supporting future scammers and spammers by encouraging account buyers by escrowing through your well established account.

Did you read my entire post? I've edited the title to make it more obvious.

I disagree on interfering transaction of BTT accounts. We are just encouraging hackers to hack more dormant account and sell it here.

Encouraging hackers to steal accounts would indeed be a very bad consequence.

[BTCappu]

 
Where is Lauda?

[pokeronlinestatus]

Yes I want to stop scammers

But I love seeing future scammers and spammers getting screwed on their first step itself.

no I don't want to escrow accounts to potential bad guys.

What are your plans to filter bad guys from rest?

There are currently still some good users around, who initially bought their account.

That can be the 1% of positive consequence of account trading but I am bothering about the rest of 99%

Did you read my entire post?

Yes, I read thrice still I could not get why you do not bother about future problems.

He made additional note to leave neutral feedback regarding user change hand. I believe this is sufficient tag to notify user that the account was not the original owner already.

Already some reputed managers accepts people with NEG tag into their campaigns. We do see many owners themselves manage campaigns and definitely they will not bother neutral trust. Neutral trust may help you not to deal with a bought account but in the vision of preventing spam, neutral trust definitely will not help.

[Coin_trader]

Already some reputed managers accepts people with NEG tag into their campaigns. We do see many owners themselves manage campaigns and definitely they will not bother neutral trust. Neutral trust may help you not to deal with a bought account but in the vision of preventing spam, neutral trust definitely will not help.

IMHO, the tag is definitely not for campaign purposes but for the future transaction of the sold account that might encounter in the future. To notify other people to deal with extreme caution and also indicate that its not the original owner anymore.

IIRC, Only red trust account that have some questionable red trust is the one who are being accepted. Trust system is decentralized so there is a possibility that the red trust is not fair which you can see on some DT trust profile.

Spam is another subject matter. The main objective of OP on creating this thread is to stop scam possibility. We should focus on that matter. 

[LoyceV]

But I love seeing future scammers and spammers getting screwed on their first step itself.

I don't. Even if the victim deserves it, the scammer doesn't deserve the profit.

What are your plans to filter bad guys from rest?

I don't have a plan, nor a solution.

Yes, I read thrice still I could not get why you do not bother about future problems.

I didn't mention it because I'm not really planning to offer this as a service. However, if account buyers are known, at least we can keep an eye on them and warn people if things go into the wrong direction (like I did here).

Already some reputed managers accepts people with NEG tag into their campaigns.

For reputed campaign managers, that could depend on the reason of the negative feedback. With 500+ DT-members, there are 500+ opinions leaving feedback that's visible by default.

Spam is another subject matter. The main objective of OP on creating this thread is to stop scam possibility. We should focus on that matter.  

Accounts get banned for spam all the time. That's indeed not my main concern.

[CryptopreneurBrainboss]

No please don't, we're trying the discourage account farming as a thing on the forum and you coming to offer an escrow service for that same purpose just goes against achieving the said agenda. The only way we can make account farming a thing of the past is to abstain from trying to encourage it. You're a very reputed member of the forum (one of the highest up there) so you, operating this service gives others a chances to think others wise before red tagging account farming which might open doors to more scams as impersonator will be all over the web trying to scams more newbies with your service.

It'll also bring a lot of controversial argument which might soil your reputation on the forum as you're likely going to get attacked by others both dt and non members since you're also an accomplice to account farming. Rethink this decision of yours, lets not create room for account farmers on the forum, it only portray this forum as a money making platform because that's what all account farmers are affected.

[khaled0111]

Theorically, it sounds like a good idea but parctically, it won't work. These kind of deals can't be made publically.
No one will buy an account knowing upfront that it will be negged and become worthless.
They prefer to take the risk of getting scammed than buying a worthless account.
Edit: most bought accounts are used to join and earn from bounty/sig campaigns, do you think reputable/professional managers will ever consider an application from a bought account!

There is another problem which is when the seller tries to recover the sold account. As an escrow, you should have guarantees that the seller will not be able to recover the account. This needs cooperation with Cryptios (accounts recovery team).

[YOSHIE]

LoyceV, selling / buying accounts using escrow, no one forbids, but that is not good.
and;

18. Having multiple accounts and account sales are allowed, but account sales are discouraged.

and;

25. Ban evasion (using or creating accounts while one of your accounts is banned) is not allowed.[e]

If this is done, these two rules must be deleted, that rule, it cannot be in the Bitcointalk forum, but it cannot be deleted, it has been running from time to time.

Should; Every member who comes to this Bitcointalk Forum must be like you and me too, starting from the small ones, so that they become adults. of them did not know would be smart.

The bad side of the account at buy there certainly.
1. If the account is bought by newcomers in this forum, who are not familiar with the forum & crypto, will be flooded by spamer.
2. It's easy for people who have a banned main account to buy it.
3. Various frauds will occur,
Example;
Loans, buy one or two accounts to register in the campaign, and many other cases can occur to the detriment of other members.

@LoyceV, it should (escrow), not recommended.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

How can we stop scammers from making a profit by pretending to sell accounts they don't have?

I'm not sure there's much any of us can do to stop that.  A scammer could always refuse to use an escrow and wait for a sucker who doesn't mind not using one either.  

If you're asking whether you should start escrowing accounts that are for sale, I have no problem with that, and I've said this before.  I certainly do not approve of account sales, but I know they're going to happen and I would not place any of the blame of the wrongness involved in the transaction on the escrower.  The escrow is just keeping both parties safe.

But I love seeing future scammers and spammers getting screwed on their first step itself.

I don't. Even if the victim deserves it, the scammer doesn't deserve the profit.

The little devil that lives on my shoulder agrees with pokeronlinestatus here and giggles with glee when someone is scammed in an account sale.  

I believe campaign abused is not a problem anymore because of the merit system and the competition in participating campaigns. Most of the bounty campaigns too are not paying anymore so buying account is not that profitable for abuser.

The merit system has certainly helped, but there are still signature campaigns out there that have a tier-based payment structure whereby higher-ranked members are paid more, so account sales are still a problem.

I don't follow the Services section, however.  Has the number of signature campaigns been decreasing?

[PrimeNumber7]

I won’t comment on the main issue, but I will say that you should set clear expectations if you do decide to enter this business. This means all involved parties understand the level of confidentiality they are receiving, the risks of the transaction that you cannot control and what actions you will take, such as leaving a neutral rating.

For example, if you promise the details of the transaction will remain confidential, you will harm your credibility if you leak details of the transaction. One might even argue you would be breaking a written agreement. You don’t necessarily need to agree to confidentiality, but you should be transparent with those involved if this is the case.

[TheBeardedBaby]

I don't think there will be any success in this kind of escrow.
People buy accounts for mainly two reasons :
- to make money from campaigns
- to scam people
Both type of buyers won't be happy having their account "marked" as sold.
When you are cheating, you don't want the others to know what you do.
Of course, you can always try but I guess there will be only 1-2 confused buyers.
I admire your willingness to help the poor cheaters to avoid being scammed.

Cheers, {still in vacation mode}

[Timelord2o67]

I will Distrust you if you start peddling in accounts.

Cautionary tales of users getting scammed by account sellers are a better way to ward off account sales.

Almost if not all users on DT 1 who distrust me have peddled in account sales at one point or another.

[suchmoon]

I am little confused here, you want to stop scammers by escrowing accounts to potential scammers and abusers?  

Yes I want to stop scammers, no I don't want to escrow accounts to potential bad guys.

Then you don't want to escrow accounts, period. The mythical "good" account buyer doesn't really exist or at the very least is a very misguided individual. One can buy a copper account from the forum itself and do pretty much anything a regular forum participant might want to do. Buying an account has only one purpose - deception.

Even if you're fine with that kind of deception, you should still treat this as any other unescrowable activity, like e.g. PayPal trades. You can try to educate users about its perils etc (although I'm sure most of them know exactly what they're doing) but if you try to escrow it you would just create a false sense of legitimacy. Escrowed PayPal can still be reversed, escrowed account can still be reclaimed - e.g. via the hacked account process.

tl;dr: no.

[Timelord2o67]

Buying an account has only one purpose - deception.

Bruno.

[pokeronlinestatus]

But I love seeing future scammers and spammers getting screwed on their first step itself.

I don't. Even if the victim deserves it, the scammer doesn't deserve the profit.

In my understanding those scammers deserve that profits because they help this community .


Edit:

I like your narrative, I just don't believe it

Honestly it took 8 hrs for me to think that way (whether scammers deserve or not). (Debating with you is not an easier one; it really juiced me out ).

[yahoo62278]

What are the positives to doing this? Only to keep newbies from being scammed? I can really see no other pros. Copper member is available, as stated by others, so companies can purchase those or pay a high rank account to post for them.

I would be ok with account sales if all feedbacks were removed and the acct had 0 trust. Maybe just a neutral showing bought/sold like you mentioned, but that wouldn't happen for reasons you stated and for the fact that sellers try to get more money based on the trust the account holds.

[LoyceV]

The little devil that lives on my shoulder agrees with pokeronlinestatus here and giggles with glee when someone is scammed in an account sale.

My little devil loves sarcasm, but doesn't giggle here. It just doesn't feel right that frowning upon account sales created an opportunity for fake sellers to scam people.

I won’t comment on the main issue, but I will say that you should set clear expectations if you do decide to enter this business. This means all involved parties understand the level of confidentiality they are receiving, the risks of the transaction that you cannot control and what actions you will take, such as leaving a neutral rating.

For example, if you promise the details of the transaction will remain confidential, you will harm your credibility if you leak details of the transaction. One might even argue you would be breaking a written agreement. You don’t necessarily need to agree to confidentiality, but you should be transparent with those involved if this is the case.

I love strict rules and disclaimers Hypothetical, that would include the end of confidentiality the moment the account does anything shady.

Cautionary tales of users getting scammed by account sellers are a better way to ward off account sales.

Maybe you're right. We can't know how many people refrained from purchasing an account because of bad odds. We only see the failed cases, not the prevented cases, which could indeed be much more.

In my understanding those scammers deserve that profits because they help this community .

I like your narrative, I just don't believe it

If it wasn't clear already: I'm not going to do this. I guess I'll just keep warning against this when I see an account sales topic.
I'll lock this topic soon.

[Timelord2067]

Cautionary tales of users getting scammed by account sellers are a better way to ward off account sales.

Maybe you're right. We can't know how many people refrained from purchasing an account because of bad odds. We only see the failed cases, not the prevented cases, which could indeed be much more.

I appreciate you taking my concerns on board.  There are already many cautionary tales in the scam accusation & reputation threads which can be used as examples & we can all track scammers where possible.

[actmyname]

It just doesn't feel right that frowning upon account sales created an opportunity for fake sellers to scam people.

Create fake account sale threads. Pretend to be a scammer. Teach someone a lesson without having them lose money in return for it.

Hopefully, you reach the ones that will learn without having been burned. Some people can actually change despite no real repercussions taking place, and you have saturated the account market with knockoffs. Lower chance of having someone encounter a con.

[TheBeardedBaby]

Isn't it better instead of escrow account buys and sells to put a warning as theymos did with the trust warnings that buying accounts is highly dangerous and can lead to scam and traded accounts will get negative feedback.
This should be shown to all newbies and not logged in users.

It's like the "don't jump off the cliff" warning, if you still do it then nobody can help you anyway...

[actmyname]

Isn't it better instead of escrow account buys and sells to put a warning as theymos did with the trust warnings that buying accounts is highly dangerous and can lead to scam and traded accounts will get negative feedback.

How would you implement that, though? Any type of keyword flag would simply be bypassed with a basic circumvention (i.e. substitutes for the word 'account'). If you were to put it in the Auctions section, account sale threads only encompass a minority of the board, and the same can be said for the Invites & Accounts section.

Good idea in theory, but not sure about the execution.

[TheBeardedBaby]

Isn't it better instead of escrow account buys and sells to put a warning as theymos did with the trust warnings that buying accounts is highly dangerous and can lead to scam and traded accounts will get negative feedback.

How would you implement that, though? Any type of keyword flag would simply be bypassed with a basic circumvention (i.e. substitutes for the word 'account'). If you were to put it in the Auctions section, account sale threads only encompass a minority of the board, and the same can be said for the Invites & Accounts section.

Good idea in theory, but not sure about the execution.

Can be on the top of any section for certain amount of time or...
The news feed is not used, i asked before why we don't use such a powerful tool to warn people, it's visible and attract attention, put there all the warnings for the newbies until they have 7 days online time and there you go.

[suchmoon]

Buying an account has only one purpose - deception.

Bruno.

Ah yes, let's bring the dead guy into the argument, real classy. But not a bad example of how no amount of escrow could fix account trading, I'll give you that. Yes Bruno was attempting a deceptive sale of his account. I locked it away while all you outraged incels were busy painting him red. Bring escrow into this and a DT account ends up in the hands of a scammer.

[Timelord2067]

Ah yes, let's bring the dead guy into the argument, real classy. But not a bad example of how no amount of escrow could fix account trading, I'll give you that. Yes Bruno was attempting a deceptive sale of his account. I locked it away while all you outraged incels were busy painting him red. Bring escrow into this and a DT account ends up in the hands of a scammer.

I might be an "incels" but Bruno still managed to scam from beyond the grave.  (which brings me back to what I was saying earlier that the ones who peddle in accounts are ones who have given me DT distrust...)

Real classy that.


Might be time to lock this thread?

[LFC_Bitcoin]

Loyce, use you own judgement. You’re one of the most trustworthy people on the entire forum. If account sales are still happening, still common then it makes genuine sense for somebody trustworthy to mediate them. There are people who don’t have a great job who might want to buy an account because it’s in a well paying sig campaign. I don’t have a problem with somebody bettering their life.

Maybe you could act as an escrow holding the account & leave it a neutral tag before you release it to the new owner. They would be unlikely to scam successfully if a DT member such as yourself puts a neutral tag on it.

It’s important people aren’t being scammed by paying for an account that doesn’t exist.

Trust your own judgement, if you want to protect potential account buyers from being scammed do it. I doubt anybody would have the balls to red tag you for it.

[sujonali1819]

I read most of the comments here and see all are against of escrowing account sale. I am also against of it.
Again some are talking about give them(hand changed account) a neutral feedback. Ok, then there is a rule should be added that hand changed account does not deserve a red tag. otherwise other DT will tag them because 500+ DT members thought/opinion is not the same. If the hand changed account got red trust after buying it with using escrow then what the benefit of using escrow here? If they don't used escrow they would be scammed by the account seller and lost the money, again if got a red trust after making successful trade using escrow that means also the buyer lost his money because the account will not be used for his needs due to red trusted.

[mprep]

Putting my and the community's opinion on whether account sales are OK / good for the forum / ethical aside, I feel like this boils down to 2 questions:

1. Do you want to legitimize (at least to a degree) and / or encourage Bitcointalk account sales?
2. Do you want to associate with Bitcointalk account sellers?

If you've answered "no" to at least one of these questions, avoid getting involved in the space (especially if you've answered "no" to question 1). When you have a reputation (good or bad) and you associate yourself with something (doesn't matter how many disclaimers you stick to it), both your reputation will rub off on that something as well as that something's reputation will rub off on you. If you're still not sure about it, weigh the positives of preventing account sale scams against the negatives of promoting an industry that's detrimental to the forum (if you believe it is) + the potential scams and spam that will inevitably come from these bought accounts.

If you're worried about the buyers, do note that these buyers (AFAIK) are:

1) Either:
    a) ignorant to the fact that account sales are frowned upon (putting in enough effort to understand that the forum can net them some cash yet not bothering to actually do their due diligence in understanding if purchasing an account is worth it)
    b) just don't care about said attitude
2) Either:
    a) gullible / ignorant / stupid / misguided enough to transact with an anonymous entity with no reputation using a non reversible currency on a forum that doesn't police potential commercial misconduct
    b) are aware of the dangers, yet still willing to go through with it

If you want to help these buyers out, educating them on the dangers (and, honestly, basics) of pseudo-anonymous e-commerce on the crypto frontier is probably where you should focus your energy. If with all that knowledge they still want to proceed with the deed, it's their gamble.

Bit OT but I sorta find it ironic that the Bitcointalk community finds account sales (which involves the sale of perceived trust / reputation, which sometimes leads to scams) deplorable yet social media bounty campaigns (which usually involves the crowdsourced purchase of perceived trust / reputation through artificially inflated social media metrics (followers, likes, retweets, etc.), which sometimes leads to scams) are all a-OK.

[Timelord2067]

Bit OT but I sorta find it ironic that the Bitcointalk community finds account sales (which involves the sale of perceived trust / reputation, which sometimes leads to scams) deplorable yet social media bounty campaigns (which usually involve the crowdsourced purchase of perceived trust / reputation through artificially inflated social media metrics, which sometimes leads to scams) are all a-OK.

And how many of those UID's have contributed to this discussion?