EQUSO.COM unsecured Loans - Stole my bitcoins on my wallet

[HedgeFx]

This a red flag for help all internet users to not make the same mistake i did

Here I tell you how this scam site ( https  ://equso . com /  - be careful , i repeat be careful!) stole my bitcoins thanks also to a flaw in the trustpilot review system, and of course to my assholery because gave him my wallet access data.

So read well and be very careful .

1) Without going too long, I registered on equso.com with the intention of applying for a bitcoin loan.
2) I had to verify my account, so I had to send in my ID and proof of identity as well as a selfie, so these criminals are also sending my IDs
3) I sent my documents on equso simply because from a first analysis of the reviews on trustpilot it seemed to be a reliable site (as well as I think other victims did)
4) I received the approval of the profile almost immediately and at the same time the screen of the site told me that you could request a loan from 3,000 to 30,000 usd already pre-approved, on the sole condition of demonstrating to have available on a bitcoin wallet 17% of the value requested in loan
5) To proceed with the loan approval I had to provide my credentials to access the wallet where my bitcoins were deposited
6) Upon receiving the login credentials to my wallet, the equso criminals recovered the wallet via recovery words and immediately transferred the balance to another anonymous wallet.
7) Once the equso thieves stole my bitcoins, they also blocked my access to their account so I could no longer log in to prove what happened.

But let's get to the evidence...

A) The trust pilot flaw
    As I said one of the reasons that made me trust equso was the series of positive reviews, even dated longer and the total absence of negative reviews. It's a pity, however, that after a more careful analysis (see attachment 1) it is clear that equso's modus operandi is to put the victims in the position of not being able to prove their accusations, asking (and obtaining) a trust pilot the cancellation of negative reviews. At the same time I invite you to read the positive reviews: all made by pseudo users with only one active review and absolutely not relevant to the service that would be offered by equso (there is not a single positive review that demonstrates or speaks of loans obtained).

 B) The scam to access my wallet and steal my bitcoins
    As I said once registered and (almost immediately) verified, I am given the opportunity to apply for a loan on the sole condition of demonstrating that I have available on a bitcoin wallet 17% of the value requested. then I proceed through their site with the request, I open a window in which I am asked for access data to my bitcoin wallet (held on blockchain. com), I provide the data (my user id and passwor to allow the connection of the equso app via API with my blockchain wallet) and in no time I get an email from blockchain. com advising me that my blockchain account had been recovered through the use of the 12 recovery words (see attachment 3 which also shows the IP used and the time): from that moment I no longer had access to my bitcoin wallet and the bitcoins present (about 0.0145 bitcoins) were immediately transferred to an unknown wallet. Of course in the meantime I also received the email confirming my loan request from equso (see attachment 2) and after a few hours also an email of approval of the loan (see attachment 4). Too bad that from the moment I made the loan request by providing my access data to the blockchain wallet, equso inhibited my access to my equso account . In the meantime I unfortunately had to report to blockchain.com the incident (attachment 5 and 6) because my blockchain.com account (which I remind you was the one where I held the bitcoins that were stolen) was also verified (with all my personal data) and my credit card was connected to it, requesting the block.

Here you can see attachements:
https://imgur.com/a/GpCAUOd

[1714989824]

1714989824

[tvplus006]

...5) To proceed with the loan approval I had to provide my credentials to access the wallet where my bitcoins were deposited
6) Upon receiving the login credentials to my wallet, the equso criminals recovered the wallet via recovery words and immediately transferred the balance to another anonymous wallet.
...

I see that you are not new to the cryptocurrency market, so I cannot understand how such a mistake could have been made that you passed the seed phrase of your wallet to outsiders. After all, everyone knows that if you are asked for a seed phrase, it means that you are dealing with scammers.

How did your communication happen? You are sure that you have communicated with Equiso employees?

[HedgeFx]

Yes , I’m not new to crypto… I’m old but I was stupid, I know it. I gave api access to my account.
Website was build very good, it use https protocol, no negative trust on internet: I was involved by this.
Fortunately I didn’t deposit more Bitcoin on my wallet.
Equso locked my account, and done this with other scammed user: yesterday another user posted his history (like mine ) on trustpilot but it was removed because he can’t demonstrate the happening.

...5) To proceed with the loan approval I had to provide my credentials to access the wallet where my bitcoins were deposited
6) Upon receiving the login credentials to my wallet, the equso criminals recovered the wallet via recovery words and immediately transferred the balance to another anonymous wallet.
...

I see that you are not new to the cryptocurrency market, so I cannot understand how such a mistake could have been made that you passed the seed phrase of your wallet to outsiders. After all, everyone knows that if you are asked for a seed phrase, it means that you are dealing with scammers.

How did your communication happen? You are sure that you have communicated with Equiso employees?

[RapTarX]

You are a Full Member in bitcointalk forum but acted like a noob THB. That's very sad; you know any feedback site can be faked. You must not trust them blindly. You are lucky that the total sum isn't big.
I'm wondering where did you find the website at the first place? Or is it quite familiar? I'm not really familiar with such lending sites; hence now idea if they are familiar or not.

[HedgeFx]

Yes, I acted as a noob
I found this on lending board. First time I stopped when Equso asked me to connect api, but after some internet research I decided to try them.

You are a Full Member in bitcointalk forum but acted like a noob THB. That's very sad; you know any feedback site can be faked. You must not trust them blindly. You are lucky that the total sum isn't big.
I'm wondering where did you find the website at the first place? Or is it quite familiar? I'm not really familiar with such lending sites; hence now idea if they are familiar or not.

[The Cryptovator]

First of all, this wouldn't be a proper way to fake a loan. It's really ridiculous to connect your wallet API or submit seeds for taking loans. To prove your address ownership sign message is enough that you would do from your wallet. Any site over the internet that asks for the personal credentials of your wallet like password, seed, or private key wouldn't be legit. Contenting API with an unknown website means they would even hack everything. You know usually, API works to manage your funds, which means they would withdraw from there as well. Do not trust reviews over the internet. It's very very easy to manipulate. Need to use your brain and make sure for true reviews. For example, if you asked this question before happening the incidents then the forum users would share opinions and share advice. Anyway thanks for sharing with the Community, we could take the lesson from here that we shouldn't trust a random review from the internet.

[Stalker22]

First of all, this wouldn't be a proper way to fake a loan. It's really ridiculous to connect your wallet API or submit seeds for taking loans. To prove your address ownership sign message is enough that you would do from your wallet. Any site over the internet that asks for the personal credentials of your wallet like password, seed, or private key wouldn't be legit.
~

I understand what you are saying here, but I can also to some extent understand why the OP made such a mistake. Due to the fact that the website is described as a peer-to-peer lending platform, the OP probably assumed that it works like DeFi services. To get a loan on such platforms, some collateral must be secured by a smart contract. The OP probably thought the same thing was happening here as well.

In this case, I believe that the biggest mistake is trusting (false) reviews on TrustPilot. However, I am not sure TrustPilot is the sole culprit, as fake reviews are nearly impossible to control on any website. I agree that the OP would have done much better if he had asked for advice on this forum first.

[24Kt]

First of all, this wouldn't be a proper way to fake a loan. It's really ridiculous to connect your wallet API or submit seeds for taking loans. To prove your address ownership sign message is enough that you would do from your wallet. Any site over the internet that asks for the personal credentials of your wallet like password, seed, or private key wouldn't be legit.
~

I understand what you are saying here, but I can also to some extent understand why the OP made such a mistake. Due to the fact that the website is described as a peer-to-peer lending platform, the OP probably assumed that it works like DeFi services. To get a loan on such platforms, some collateral must be secured by a smart contract. The OP probably thought the same thing was happening here as well.

In this case, I believe that the biggest mistake is trusting (false) reviews on TrustPilot. However, I am not sure TrustPilot is the sole culprit, as fake reviews are nearly impossible to control on any website. I agree that the OP would have done much better if he had asked for advice on this forum first.

Reading the case of the OP, scammers are really good in deceiving people. Even long time crypto users can fall from their trap. But one major lesson here is that you should not really trust your seed phrase or password to anyone. If they asked about it, doubt their legitimacy.

@OP, have you reported their site to google - https://safebrowsing.google.com/safebrowsing/report_phish/?rd=1&hl=en

I just did, I put it as a scam site and stealing funds from users. You may want to do it also, because the more reports they received, the higher possibility of taking down the site.