What to do once a scammer is exposed

[opieum2]

A few suggestions which are subject to differences in opinion. But knowing the marketing these companies employ to get the word out, its important to note that they will not just restrict themselves to BCT for sales or their scams. The point of this post is to begin publicly shaming these people into acting appropriately and stop their scamming. Also getting word out there to get law enforcement to take action

-First HAVE THE FACTS!! Do not make the mistake of posting your opinions as fact. If there is proof of a past and present scam on the part of the individual or company, POST IT UP. Get the word out in the relevant forums without violating the rules of that sub-forum. Let others work with you to validate those facts.
-Once those facts have been validated (or invalidated) whatever info you have that is legit, use it. Take to twitter, facebook and any other popular social media site and follow every bitcoin related news site out there and get the word out.
-Be persistent. If there were laws involved and actual fiat currency was stolen let law enforcement know via their twitter feeds (many have them). Just get the word out and let them know as well. They will do their job eventually on that front and look into it.


Fact is it's time that we as a community really started stepping up the game. The current method of exposing scammers has worked, but the scammers are getting slicker about evading the law and it's on us to expose them quicker and get the word out faster. At least for those who are serious about doing so.

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[Snipe85]

This should be a sticky, there's a lot of threads here with opinions and suspicions. People tend to accuse others of dishonesty for fun, or before contacting them, but what would you expect from the internet community?

[crazy-pilot]

This should be a sticky, there's a lot of threads here with opinions and suspicions. People tend to accuse others of dishonesty for fun, or before contacting them, but what would you expect from the internet community?

There is a stick regarding how to make a scam report already and that sticky says that evidence should be presented.

There is really no reason as to why you would want to go to other social media as most scammers do not have a 'social presence' beyond this forum and most people on here do not have their RL identity associated with them

[jc01480]

In the event of a continuing scheme of events it is appropriate to attempt to make others aware of some things.  Otherwise, let the authorities handle it. 

[Kassenzettel]

This forum need to do something agains all this scammers and scumbags!

[r3wt]

report them to your local state police department. then to the FBI. it might not stop a small timer, but the big guys will go down if enough people report them.

[finlon]

report them to your local state police department. then to the FBI. it might not stop a small timer, but the big guys will go down if enough people report them.

Does the police department handles cases where a fraud in bitcoin has been commited, and people have screenshots and messages as proof?

[r3wt]

report them to your local state police department. then to the FBI. it might not stop a small timer, but the big guys will go down if enough people report them.

Does the police department handles cases where a fraud in bitcoin has been commited, and people have screenshots and messages as proof?

of course.

[crazy-pilot]

report them to your local state police department. then to the FBI. it might not stop a small timer, but the big guys will go down if enough people report them.

Does the police department handles cases where a fraud in bitcoin has been commited, and people have screenshots and messages as proof?

I don't think the police/courts would be able to accept a screenshot as proof. They would need actual records from the forum's system of record, which would likely only be able to be obtained via a warrant.

Also the question of someone getting charged is not a factor of how many people report them it is a factor of if there is evidence of a crime and if it is a good idea to try to prosecute someone for such crime

[taiwww]

i just believe karma to him.

her son/daughter or family we don't know.

[opieum2]

That is incorrect. Many of them have FB pages in particular mining manufacturers, and yet they do not reveal the people behind the profiles. They have twitter accounts and various other social media presences in order to optimize their SEO rankings. They know this is critical to getting more money. It is how BFL worked for so long and how they managed to snag so many people in.  Others do the same thing. Granted not all will have a social media presence but many do.

If you don't like social media, my advice is get a VPN connection like privateinternetaccess (link at the bottom of this page) create an account as its about as anonymous as you will get and have a blast exposing them on their own feeds.

This should be a sticky, there's a lot of threads here with opinions and suspicions. People tend to accuse others of dishonesty for fun, or before contacting them, but what would you expect from the internet community?

There is a stick regarding how to make a scam report already and that sticky says that evidence should be presented.

There is really no reason as to why you would want to go to other social media as most scammers do not have a 'social presence' beyond this forum and most people on here do not have their RL identity associated with them

[opieum2]

report them to your local state police department. then to the FBI. it might not stop a small timer, but the big guys will go down if enough people report them.

Does the police department handles cases where a fraud in bitcoin has been commited, and people have screenshots and messages as proof?

I don't think the police/courts would be able to accept a screenshot as proof. They would need actual records from the forum's system of record, which would likely only be able to be obtained via a warrant.

Also the question of someone getting charged is not a factor of how many people report them it is a factor of if there is evidence of a crime and if it is a good idea to try to prosecute someone for such crime

This is not entirley true. They do take and use screenshots provided the original raw file can be provided AND it can be backed up with the actual file. Additionally they will accept web.archive.org as evidence of an uninvolved 3rd party. The screenshots are used or a video that shows the same material.

[FattyMcButterpants]

report them to your local state police department. then to the FBI. it might not stop a small timer, but the big guys will go down if enough people report them.

Does the police department handles cases where a fraud in bitcoin has been commited, and people have screenshots and messages as proof?

I don't think the police/courts would be able to accept a screenshot as proof. They would need actual records from the forum's system of record, which would likely only be able to be obtained via a warrant.

Also the question of someone getting charged is not a factor of how many people report them it is a factor of if there is evidence of a crime and if it is a good idea to try to prosecute someone for such crime

This is not entirley true. They do take and use screenshots provided the original raw file can be provided AND it can be backed up with the actual file. Additionally they will accept web.archive.org as evidence of an uninvolved 3rd party. The screenshots are used or a video that shows the same material.

Internet archive sites can be manipulated.

The same is true with a screen shot. The court would likely only accept the actual messages/posts from the forum. If a screen shot of a internet archive site was used then the evidence could easily be impeached and reasonable doubt would be created to get any scammer off the hook

[opieum2]

report them to your local state police department. then to the FBI. it might not stop a small timer, but the big guys will go down if enough people report them.

Does the police department handles cases where a fraud in bitcoin has been commited, and people have screenshots and messages as proof?

I don't think the police/courts would be able to accept a screenshot as proof. They would need actual records from the forum's system of record, which would likely only be able to be obtained via a warrant.

Also the question of someone getting charged is not a factor of how many people report them it is a factor of if there is evidence of a crime and if it is a good idea to try to prosecute someone for such crime

This is not entirley true. They do take and use screenshots provided the original raw file can be provided AND it can be backed up with the actual file. Additionally they will accept web.archive.org as evidence of an uninvolved 3rd party. The screenshots are used or a video that shows the same material.

Internet archive sites can be manipulated.

The same is true with a screen shot. The court would likely only accept the actual messages/posts from the forum. If a screen shot of a internet archive site was used then the evidence could easily be impeached and reasonable doubt would be created to get any scammer off the hook

Not when said site is web.archive.org. It has timestamped items on there. And there is precedent.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayback_Machine
More than just this but these are the most notable with some very large cases.

It is useful to point out that the things in this forum should ALSO be waybacked if a scammer says one thing and gets caught out there. I did this repeatedly to Joshua Zipkin AMT CEO who has lied and scammed. Because he admitted he had figured out a way to beat the mirror bitcointa.lk, I opted to archive anythign he said after he posted it. Called him out and then caught him editing his posts after the fact.

But to point out the fact. Yes a court will use this. And all they need is to get a sworn affadavit from the admins at web.archive.org which they have done in the past and that is it.

Admissable evidence. Screenshots can be used to a point. But they can and have been used.
I work in compliance and legal work on the IT side for a very very large corporation. And it is a VERY strictly regulatated space. I am asked to produce screenshots for certain kinds of access reports instead of excel files because excel is subject to manipulation. Regulators would prefer that over the excel (though they want those too to compare).

And these are US government regulators. So obviously there is a legal value to them. So its not just me stating it.

http://federalevidence.com/blog/2011/december/authenticating-internet-screenshot-evidence-under-fre-901

There are obviously stipulations to consider BUT overall it is possible to submit as evidence. There is legal precedent and a case can be made to use it fairly easily.