Less-know scam: Crypto hardware

[TravelMug]

I came across this article last week, and I would agree that this is a less know scam that can start again since we are somewhat in a bull run. So the scam goes like this.

(a) pre-ordering mining gear with a promised of good performance

One example of such a hardware scheme was Squirrel Research Labs, as initially promoted by Kristy-Leigh Minehan, aka OmgAGirl. This venture sold over a million dollars worth of FPGA’s, promoted as hardware that would be able to mine Monero.

Instead of Monero, this hardware was only able to mine a handful of altcoins. No one broke even on these FGPA’s.

I try to search the forum about this product, Acorn M.2 FPGA based GPU Accelerator.

And if you go look at the very bottom of the page, it seems that they have pulled a scam here.

And here is the scam accusations Acorn M.2 FPGA based GPU Accelerator-Considering legal action!.

The other project is Obelisk Inc, Lead by Siacoin developer David Vorick, and operated by Zach Zerbert, Ken Carpenter and Jacob Johnston.

And this is what I found out, First Asic for SIA - Obelisk SC1.

Again you just have to look at the comments from more experience player in the mining like @Searing to understand that it is also a scam.

Then they try to salvage by launching a GRIN Asic miner, but it also failed obviously.Obelisk Tech Grin Asics.

(b) Fork hardware wallet - we can't really trust them with our precious BTC.

The same people behind the failed and scam Obelisk project re-invent themselves, created Coinkite which is a fork of an open source ColdCard wallet.

So what happened? Coinkite Is Closing Down Its Web Wallet.

The full article can be seen here: https://medium.com/coinmonks/rekt-crypto-hardware-con-artists-creep-into-bitcoin-8ad713198d3a

Again, this is not well-known but it doesn't mean that these kind of people are not going to pull this stunt again.

[cryptomaniac_xxx]

Comparing the two, it's most likely that the scam attempt (a) will be more viable for scammers to pull in this current situation, although there are well known mining companies, but this scammers might target Altcoin mining gear and re-create this fraudulent stunt. For all we know, this might be ongoing already. For the hardware wallet, bitcoin enthusiast already rely on Ledger and Nano and they are ahead of the competition already, but nevertheless, we should also be very careful of new players coming in this niche.

[Jating]

I think it's a good sales pitch though, even Bitmain and Canaan as far as I know have promised their clients with new and high performance machines. But those have built their reputations already, so perhaps many are still falling for this kind of tricks specially in 2017-2018, but everyone should really be careful of this "pre-ordering" scheme specially coming from a no name company. And even if you read positive reviews, it doesn't mean that it is genuine and coming from so called customers.

[Yaunfitda]

People shouldn't pre-order things from company without good reputation and history.

The only reason I can think of is that those company are claiming superior technology and performances with their mining gear and probably throwing lots of study or even graphs to convince potential victims.

Besides, just because a new hardware wallet is forked/based on another popular hardware wallet, people shouldn't think it'll be good hardware wallet.

For the wallet, I will say that it's odd and although we have seen forked coins, I never heard of a fork hardware wallet though.

[Lucius]

For the wallet, I will say that it's odd and although we have seen forked coins, I never heard of a fork hardware wallet though.

Anything that can be copied in any way sooner or later will be copied, just look how many forks Bitcoin has so far - and we all know that no copy could surpass the original in anything. There was some fake Trezor One wallets, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t fake devices from other manufacturers as well. All such devices are very easy to recognize - they are much cheaper than the original, and are sold on eBay or similar sites.