Do scams harm Bitcoin's reputation in the mainstream world?

[Abiky]

There has been a lot of scams within the crypto space over the course of its lifetime. Most recently, a Twitter hack that took the accounts of prominent figures within the mainstream world, has been all over the news. Mainstream media has been making people believe that Bitcoin is "bad" by tying it to the Twitter hack. While malicious actors demanded to be paid in Bitcoin, it doesn't mean that the cryptocurrency itself is a scam. Unfortunately, many people in the mainstream world have commented about Bitcoin negatively because of the recent hack. Despite these unfortunate series of events, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are experiencing huge gains on the market.

Do you think that scams harm Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies' reputation in the mainstream world? What will it take for people to distance scams from Bitcoin itself? Thoughts?

[Baofeng]

What will it take for people to distance scams from Bitcoin itself? Thoughts?

Even prior to the twitter hack, bitcoin has been called with so many names, like scams, ponzi schemes, being used by criminals (drug lords, terrorists) etc. And yet it still survived, get to a new all time high in 2017, suffers a long bearish trend, bounce back. In short it is very resilient and it's already proven that no matter what negativity they thrown, it doesn't have long term impact. So regardless if we have a twitter hack in the name of bitcoin, I don't see it's reputation being harm in the mainstream much worst than the media attacks back on 2016-2017.

"If you can't beat them, join them"

[LeGaulois]

Only in the short term to me. When there is money to make people forget everything LOL.
But let's be honest, they also publish positive news for Bitcoin when there is something that drive traffic. There aren't many websites publishing 100% anti-bitcoin articles.
They write what bring traffic, as I say, since it's how it gives revenues.

And if you compare with the old times, many were talking bad about BTC but now in 2020, they have a cryptocurrency category on their website with a lot of different contents (news, videos, interviews, market research, analyses, etc)...

(On a side note, the Panama Papers scandal didn't give a bad reputation to the US dollar. It's just to give a comparison when it's about rep)

[Gotumoot]

Of course it does but I think it would depend on the person if they would care about it or not.
But base on my own experience it really does have an effect on the people around me some of them would get scared whenever they hear about scam on crypto or some would just ask random things about it.
And for the record those people doesn't even have an investment on crypto they are just curious about it and no matter how hard I tried to explain they just seems to see it as an investment tool.

[cryptoperkele]

Yes, but mostly because people don't understand Bitcoin. To some it's an internet magic money and they already know that internet is full of scams. It's just one more to these people. I was pleasantly surprised that twitter hack didn't do more damage to bitcoin. I was sure it would be dealt as a "bitcoin hack" in the media, but people didn't seem to agree with the headlines. They seemed to understand that it had everything to do with the twitter and less with bitcoin.

[jossiel]

It do affects bitcoin's reputation most of the time. Yeah, even before that it's only just known on the dark market, they are all calling it the money only for criminals.

But progressively, that bad reputation start to change. The bitcoin scam is only known by those people who don't understand what bitcoin is. To us and others that understands what bitcoin is, we know what it is and it is the hacks and scams that are the real enemy.

[online73]

Hello to all. There is no doubt that the actions of fraudsters negatively affect the image of Bitcoin. But the image, and different opinions about any branch of our life, is just a manipulation of the news coverage. Unfortunately, in the leading media, I have never heard positive comments and positive reviews about the cryptocurrency space. One can only hear that "scammers", ... "bitcoin fell again ...", "... people lost money ..." and stuff like that. I myself, when I first got acquainted with the cryptocurrency world, began to ask my friends about bitcoin, more than 90 percent of the respondents said that it was all a scam. People are too lazy to delve into the truth. Until the majority of people stumble directly with Bitcoin, and they themselves do not feel all the advantages of the cryptocurrency world, negative news will do their dirty work. Unfortunately, it is common for a person to hang labels on things that he does not understand at all, and it is very difficult to get rid of such labels later. I believe that we, who have accepted the cryptocurrency market, with all its positive and negative qualities, just need to show and tell uninitiated people the pitfalls of cryptocurrency, and without exaggeration, explain all the advantages. Well, globally, I think it's useless to do anything - basically, people in power are far from digital assets, they are poorly educated in this area, cunning, greedy and deaf to the needs of ordinary people. I think until this generation of thieves' governments leaves, nothing will change for the better. Bitcoin is a digital miracle that will pave its way for itself, but we will do our best to promote this.

[FlightyPouch]

It have some effect but it doesn't last that long. A lot of scams that happened and bitcoin just kept in comkng or bouncing back giving more profits to its users and investors. People here in our province thought it is a scam since it is reported in the news but they realized it is not since I've been using it 2 years since that news reporting.

[erikoy]

Definitely as it seem that more scammers now taking the advantage of using bitcoin to scam others. There are many hackers and  scammers with bitcoin this is why users are being careful. However, still being careful is not enough because these people doing fraud are also innovative and techie that can lured one on getting scam. Just like for an example using the malicious progra that could use to phished out important details on wallet like private key. These malicious program are those like ads popping or browsers extension maybe. Anyway just always be careful.guys..

[hulla]

Do you think that scams harm Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies' reputation in the mainstream world?

The only harm i think scam will cause is more restrictions rules from the SEC cause scam was the reason why KYC/AML was introduced in crypto investment. However, people seems to have already understand the risk in crypto investment.

What will it take for people to distance scams from Bitcoin itself? Thoughts?

Scam will be distance from Bitcoin the moment investors and traders totally comprehend how scammers operate and avoid human error.

[posi]

Although the scam situation that happened dont have effect on the bitcoin market but that doesnt mean bitcoin reputation was not harm or it global adoption was not affected by scam activities happening because we have some government which are planning to legalize bitcoin and the scam issue could change their mind. Besides, none of all crypto exchange site have adequate security save from hackers.

[Oasisman]

Only those who don't understand this technology and those who are against it will continue to make a negative image to Bitcoin. But, as soon as they understand how Bitcoin promotes privacy in transactions, freedom to spend your money without any third party companies, even taxes, and the opportunity to make profit by just holding it for long term would make people turn to engage into Bitcoin. Bitcoin has been tagged in so many criminal activities from the past up until now, but it's current value is telling us "no, all of those negative news won't affect me."

[Yamifoud]

Do you think that scams harm Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies' reputation in the mainstream world? What will it take for people to distance scams from Bitcoin itself? Thoughts?

Its a big denial to say that people might ignore that, all they heard and see in the news will give them some hints to be careful in investing crypto and might also drive into doubtful minds. But for those who really believe Bitcoin and crypto will never think about it instead, they keep investing as they know that these hacking events is already a part of our life even outside crypto. We all can be possible a target to these hackers but if we anticipated it first (as most people did) they never succeed.

[dothebeats]

It does, but the effects aren’t really grave since most people’s attention isn’t really fixated on bitcoin and crypto developments. They still tend to forget that some things happen on bitcoin when it’s hitting the charts and markets, showing some great returns to its investors. While the mainstream media still depicts bitcoin on a bad light on some instances, people now tend to search for more information rather than believing what mass media is to say about the crypto. This also made the general population ‘smarter’ when it comes to crypto-related matters since there are subtle warnings plastered almost everywhere regarding crypto scams. I guess, in a way, those depictions helped bitcoin by serving as an initial warning to everyone on the possibilities that might happen when dealing with bitcoin.

[harizen]

Do you think that scams harm Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies' reputation in the mainstream world? What will it take for people to distance scams from Bitcoin itself? Thoughts?

Since then, yes. Crypto-related scams always lead to negative impressions especially at those people who are totally unaware of what bitcoin or cryptocurrency as a whole is all about. One good example here in my country where even crypto is now highly recognized (at least), I think 6 out of 10 people (around me) will say that bitcoin is always a scam-related thing.

Fortunately, no need to really enlightened them about the issue. As crypto progress, some people here, in fairness, realized that bitcoin is not a scam and it's just been used as a tool to do some sh*t.

This kind of impression about crypto is part of the process. People have different views so let them just think about what bitcoin really is, good or bad. After all, it won't affect the adoption.

[Lanatsa]

Do you think that scams harm Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies' reputation in the mainstream world? What will it take for people to distance scams from Bitcoin itself? Thoughts?

We have been dealing on this thing since from the beginning even bitcoins price is still cheap where scams and frauds do happen but it still proves out that these kind of unfortunate events
or negative news wont really give out such impact directly or on spot.

Market can crash without even knowing its true reason behind and same goes for pumping on which we do have questions on why the heck it pumped even the news around
are mostly negatives?

This proves out that this market is really unpredictable in spite of its cons. Just let those people believe on things that they had in mind because sooner or later they would surely seek
of on whats the actual thing behind bitcoin and they would change up their stance towards it.

[Wexnident]

If it was in the beginning sure. First weeks, months, year? Yea, scams about Bitcoin would have harmed it quite a lot. But we're a decade from that already, I doubt scams would even affect Bitcoin that much anymore. Probably the ignorant ones, but let's be real, if they actually learned about Bitcoin, those notions would automatically disappear. I also said this in my post a few days ago, but if Bitcoin scams affected Bitcoin that much, then really, scams with fiat should've destroyed the system already. But it didn't, why? Well, most would push it up because of government backing but really, it's because Fiat is a medium, why would you blame a medium, an item, for you being scammed? Same idea with Bitcoin tbh. If that doesn't work, you can just chalk up most people ignoring Bitcoin due to scams to ignorance.

[LogitechMouse]

Bitcoin has been attached to numerous scams already for many years already and even the twitter hack incident didn't happen, many are saying bad things about Bitcoin.
It is not that Bitcoin is scam but there are many more.
Bitcoin is a ponzi scheme
Bitcoin is a dead coin in the future
Bitcoin has no value
Bitcoin is a shitcoin
Bitcoin is a fraud.

What happened to those who said negative things in Bitcoin?? They tried to join and learn the technology behind it because they know that it is the future. Whatever they say to Bitcoin, it will always be victorious.
Now regarding the question, I can say that scams may affect the Bitcoin's reputations but in the end they will regret avoiding it because we already saw the price trend of it.

[Twinkledoe]

What will it take for people to distance scams from Bitcoin itself? Thoughts?

If people will educate themselves about what crypto or bitcoin is, they will know that it is the same as fiat money, which is very vulnerable to scamming. So I think, education is the key for people to understand the world of bitcoin. Without knowing its basics and just relying on the media, will not give them good grasp how crypto works.

[Coining26]

They do because no one wants to be associated with something that has had arm involving it.

Yeah there are scams with normal money but people still want to be a part of that since they're used to it. Bitcoin is new compared to normal/fiat money so people have trouble wrapping their minds around and getting involved despite the risks.