███ Stay away from GAWminers.com / Paycoin / Paybase - Mineral - SCAM ! ███

[LiteCoinGuy]

In the last days i read alot about the GAWminers.com-story and i recommend that everybody should do that. I guess we could end here with an "mtgox 2.0" scenario and that will hurt bitcoins reputation. I dont want that. Thats the reason for this topic and the time that i "waste" with it   .

The story began with an article from the news-site coinfire. I visit alot of these sites and alot of them post crap-news or get paid for their news (google). I cant say something bad about coinfire and no, i dont get paid to write that. There are also other good pages like Coindesk and so on...or the news section here on the forum  



Is GAW Miners Lying about Partnerships?

Recently the CEO of GAW Miners claimed publicly that the company and he personally have sealed up partnerships and deals with Target, Amazon, and Walmart about the coin and the company.

Josh also made a claim in an interview with CCN about Authy that they were single-handedly stress testing the Authy service because the requests are so high and outperforming other Authy users,

"ZenCloud Now Sends More Requests to Authy (a 2 factor authentication service) than Coinbase and CEX!

And, it’s all because of you guys.

Earlier this week, Authy called us and said our users were stressing their network. Authy is an amazing company. Turns out ZenCloud users are pinging Authy for more 2FA requests than any other company in the space. Even more than CoinBase and CEX.io received communication from Authy."

( -> not a single proof about that claim. )

Coin Fire has learned these recent claims are stretching the truth or outright lies.

...

While Josh is declaring publicly and implying a partnership with all three companies it would seem that all three are disavowing any sort of partnership. We have reached out to GAW Miners for a statement about these statements but once again the company has repeatedly denied our staff a statement.

( -> all companies denied that they deal with "GAWminers.com". A clear lie from GAWminers.com.  not a single proof about that claim . )

Coin Fire has reached out multiple times for comments on this story and a response from GAW Miners before publishing this article. If Josh Garza and GAW Miners can give complete evidence that any of the companies he has before mentioned are entering a BONAFIDE partnership and said company is willing to go on the record we will update this story. However, at this time, each company has OUTRIGHT DENIED each of Garza’s statements.

(-> no comment of course. no proof about anything )

https://coinfire.cf/2014/11/22/is-gaw-miners-lying-about-partnerships/


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Next story was posted by coinfire some months ago:


Review: Plenty of Concerns with GAW Miners Hashlet Service

GAW Miners recently made the rounds with a blitz of marketing and excitement with the launch of the new GAW Miners Hashlet.

...

I found it strange that the company implies that you are pointing your mining power to a different pool however when you are changing where you are mining but it turns out that this isn’t actually the case. Initially several pool operators that are on the site as option began crying foul when they saw zero increase of hashing power on the pools they operated and began asking the company to give proof that miners were actually coming online for the pool selected.

...

I also have found it strange that the company markets miners that are named after the various pool offerings when those miners will never actually touch those pools. While his justification can make sense on a certain level the simple fact is that it implies the miners actually run on those pools for many users.

Another issue that I have with the service is that they have NOT provided proof of a single block mined to date.

I have an issue with a provider that doesn’t give transparency about the miners, where they are mining, what the current hash rate is, where that power is pointed and proof that they are mining. It has been quite sometime since they concerns have been raised on various forums across the Internet and the company has failed to discuss many of them to date.

...

Coin Fire reached out to GAW Miners several times for a comment before running this piece and each time we received zero response.

( -> what a suprise. not a single proof about their mining. not even a fake-photo! )


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


A Critical Look at GAWminers.com

So I've been seeing quite a bit of buzz about this new cloud miner called "the Hashlet" which is being promoted at every corner by GAWminers. Intrigued, I went to look at the product and found the following claims:

"Guaranteed Profitability! Because the maintenence fee for Hashlets reduces over time, the hashlet will always be making money forever. There's no chance of a negative return.
Only Hashlets can mine on the "ZenPool", which can deliver twice the payout of any other pool."

If GAW is a Ponzi it's a shame that this will be many newbies first introduction to the crypto world.


(-> the never ending money-machine. we found it   )

http://www.asicspace.com/blog/2014/11/13/a-critical-look-at-gawminerscom


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Summary:

1 ) They are selling virtual hashes without the actual machines backing it.

2 ) No relevant pictures of their hardware and datacenter

3 ) They are falsify payouts according to pools that never existed or never received hashes from GAW.

4 ) They are known and have been caught using shill accounts. Not just the company but the CEO himself - Josh Garza!

5 ) They said that confire never contacted them before they published the story - lie !

6 ) They said they work with Amazon and Walmart - lie !

7 ) Where is the serious audit of the company ? Garza said there was one in the begin of december 2014      - lie !

8 ) Promised price floor of 20 USD - lie !
     http://imgur.com/f8232EK
     https://archive.today/erGhz

9 ) Why have the venture capital funders that provided the $100 Million funding you claim to have,    not been identified? Why have the funds never been shown to exist even once?

10 ) Stolen logo: https://paybase.com/
                         https://www.gopago.com/

       New stolen logo: https://i.imgur.com/CTx1y3M.png

11 ) No comment on these serious questions / problems.

12 & the end) proven Scam  

We all know that bitcoin will always attract bad actors. This story isnt the first and isnt the last one. We should do what we can to prevent the bad end.


Some more links:

http://qntra.net/2015/04/garza-friends-additional-emails-detailed/

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/paybase-shuts-down

http://coinfire.io/2015/02/25/mastercard-denies-paycoin-partnership/

http://www.coindesk.com/gaw-8-million-zenminer-investment-lie/

http://coinfire.io/2015/03/06/coin-fire-gaw-miners-catches-sec-ftc-irs-dhs-attention/

http://qntra.net/2015/03/leaked-emails-detail-inner-workings-of-josh-garzas-scams/

http://coinbrief.net/gaw-miners-fraud/

http://coinfire.io/2015/02/04/gaw-miners-attorneys-confirm-sec-investigation/

http://www.btcfeed.net/news/coinfire-site-down-due-to-stolen-domain-paycoin-supporters-suspected/

go to coinfire.io (new website after attack)

https://coinfire.cf/2015/01/21/paybase-operating-illegally-without-msb-licenses/

https://coinfire.cf/2015/01/19/sec-investigation-of-gaw-miners-underway/

https://coinfire.cf/2015/01/09/xpy-purchasing-by-credit-card-disabled-by-stripe-for-tos-violation/

https://coinfire.cf/2014/10/15/gaw-miners-hashlet-review/

http://qntra.net/2014/10/gaw-miners-revealed-as-the-jizz-moppers-supreme/

https://medium.com/@BTCtom/cryptocoinsnews-and-gaw-miners-sitting-in-a-tree-k-i-s-s-i-n-g-afe20eecc080?r=reddit

http://techcrunch.com/2014/08/08/an-interview-with-josh-garza-ceo-of-gaw-miners-on-his-1-million-purchase-of-btc-com/

http://de.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2njno5/ama_request_josh_garza_if_what_you_say_is_true/

http://de.scribd.com/doc/248372603/Coinfire-Cease-and-Desist

http://techcrunch.com/2014/08/08/an-interview-with-josh-garza-ceo-of-gaw-miners-on-his-1-million-purchase-of-btc-com/

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2nivi0/gaw_miners_take_down_notice_to_coin_fire/cme227c

http://de.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2r2qn4/i_found_josh_garzas_bitcointalk_account_turns_out/

http://www.btcfeed.net/fraud/paycoin-next-big-scam-crypto/

https://coinfire.cf/2014/12/31/amazon-further-denies-paybase-gaw-miners-involvement/#comment-5183

https://coinfire.cf/2014/12/31/massive-security-breach-at-paybase/


History of the CEO:

http://www.reddit.com/r/litecoinmining/comments/1yqx55/mining_rig_builders_do_not_sell_anything_or/

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[khornate]

Bitmain confirmed that they have bought over 5 petahash from them https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=827552.msg9378239#msg9378239

Keep on making shit up though bro

[inBitweTrust]

Bitmain confirmed that they have bought over 5 petahash from them https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=827552.msg9378239#msg9378239

Keep on making shit up though bro

Aren't you making a false dichotomy here? Since 5 Petahashes represents a fraction of their total hashing power is it not a real possibility they are selling a percentage of fractional virtual hashes as a ponzi scheme?

https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/gavin-andresen-suspects-ponzi-schemes-bitcoin-cloud-mining/

[bf4btc]

Bitmain confirmed that they have bought over 5 petahash from them https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=827552.msg9378239#msg9378239

Keep on making shit up though bro

Aren't you making a false dichotomy here? Since 5 Petahashes represents a fraction of their total hashing power is it not a real possibility they are selling a percentage of fractional virtual hashes as a ponzi scheme?

https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/gavin-andresen-suspects-ponzi-schemes-bitcoin-cloud-mining/

What would the point of that be? If they were to operate a ponzi scheme then they would just take funds from customers to buy the hashlets to payout the mining revenue, there would be no need to buy actual mining equipment. Also the 5 PHs represents the additional mining capacity they are purchasing, not their existing capacity (5 PHs is ~1.8% of the total network).

In regards to the controversy over their new altcoin, I don't see why people can't wait a little while to see who exactly will accept it as payment.

[inBitweTrust]

Also the 5 PHs represents the additional mining capacity they are purchasing, not their existing capacity (5 PHs is ~1.8% of the total network).

I can trust the claim of the 5PH but there are doubts as to their total unverified capacity.

What would the point of that be? If they were to operate a ponzi scheme then they would just take funds from customers to buy the hashlets to payout the mining revenue, there would be no need to buy actual mining equipment.

The point being they can use that receipt as a way to assuage fears from potential cloud mining clients while they continue to sell fractional virtual hashes at a greater profit. It is far more profitable to simply operate a ponzi scheme where almost all users are not seeing a ROI than actually backing up 100% of their claimed hashes with ASIC's.

Fractional mining is so tempting that I would suspect that most if not all companies selling cloud mining are doing this to a degree.

[bf4btc]

What would the point of that be? If they were to operate a ponzi scheme then they would just take funds from customers to buy the hashlets to payout the mining revenue, there would be no need to buy actual mining equipment.

The point being they can use that receipt as a way to assuage fears from potential cloud mining clients while they continue to sell fractional virtual hashes at a greater profit. It is far more profitable to simply operate a ponzi scheme where almost all users are not seeing a ROI than actually backing up 100% of their claimed hashes with ASIC's.

Fractional mining is so tempting that I would suspect that most if not all companies selling cloud mining are doing this to a degree.
[/quote]It is my understanding that their coin will launch in the very near future so I doubt that they would get very much incremental business by the time it launches.

Do you know how much they paid for the 5PH of ants? Do you know how much someone would need to hypothetically pay for as much mining capacity as gaw claims to have?

I would agree with you over the short term, however there does not appear to be very many risks to the company once the miners are sold so if they are trying to be in business over the long term it would likely be more profitable to act honestly. You should remember that some of their users have received payments that have exceed the cost of their miners.

[inBitweTrust]

I would agree with you over the short term, however there does not appear to be very many risks to the company once the miners are sold so if they are trying to be in business over the long term it would likely be more profitable to act honestly.

If they were acting honestly it would be trivial for them to provide more proof as a way to bolster their reputation and advertise their product. Whether or not there are risks for them purchasing ASICs(I contend there are many) is a moot point because my concerns lie with the motivations being much stronger based upon the much higher profitability of running a fractional ponzi scheme than actually investing and maintaining ASIC's which quickly lose their value.

You should remember that some of their users have received payments that have exceed the cost of their miners.

Sure, it is hypothetically possible to turn a profit cloud mining, just like its is possible to win at gambling in Las Vegas. I would contend that gambling in a regulated Casino in Vegas is a better investment than cloud mining however. Proving thus is simply a matter of comparing casino 95-98% payouts to the average ROI of a person cloud mining.

[gogxmagog]

I keep looking over claims and sometimes proof, posative and negative, about the validity of GAW and can not seem to draw a definitive conclusion. However, I've been here long enough to see that where there is smoke there is usually fire, and not the sporadic, easily refuted, measly little puffs of smoke raised by every other troll in here who are guaranteed to attack every single offering and new coin no matter what, NO! I mean prolonged huge plumes of thick black smoke coming from every sub and let out by known trusted bitcointalk users with blatant smoking guns lying all over the place... that is what GAW looks like.

Maybe I'm wrong and I will have to bear the unthinkable shame of having a few 12 yr old basement dwelling trolls to call me a poopy-head etc. but who cares? Type "GAW" into the search bar up in the top right of this page...you will not like what you see.

Be safe, not sorry. Sit back and watch GAW, but do not invest. That is what I am doing. The potential for profit is tiny, the potential for total loss is so big I cant see around it.

[Morguk]

"Josh Garza @gawceo  ·  22h 22 hours ago
We had a detailed review by a highly respected 3rd party today. They reviewed our wallets and mining center information. Public next week!"

Wait for this and then eat your own words.

[funtotry]

Be safe, not sorry. Sit back and watch GAW, but do not invest. That is what I am doing. The potential for profit is tiny, the potential for total loss is so big I cant see around it.

This is probably a good idea. The realistic potential profit from investing in gaw's hashlets is very small, and realistically has a negative EV if you were to make realistic long term difficulty increase predictions. While if it turns out that gaw is planning on scamming their customers then the customers stand to lose everything.

I don't personally think that gaw is a ponzi/is scamming however I do think the risk is great for anyone investing in their hashlets

[cyberpinoy]

Shit like this is why its so hard to accomplish anything in this damn industry, we spend more time researching and doin diligence than we do mining and profiting. Why the hell do so many assholes take this industry as a scammers paradise, no matter if its FUD morons or the actual scammers themselves. I just wish there was some kind of virus that attacked scammers and would eliminate them.

I have been looking into GAW for a while was even very interested they were doing a coin, and now look, I dont know who to believe the OP or the GAW lovers posting here, I hope the OP is wrong as I have a few friends heavily invested in GAW.

[alani123]

Bitmain confirmed that they have bought over 5 petahash from them https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=827552.msg9378239#msg9378239

Keep on making shit up though bro

Aren't you making a false dichotomy here? Since 5 Petahashes represents a fraction of their total hashing power is it not a real possibility they are selling a percentage of fractional virtual hashes as a ponzi scheme?

https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/gavin-andresen-suspects-ponzi-schemes-bitcoin-cloud-mining/

Interestingly enough the confirmation from BITMAIN Came on October 30 and they said that the miners are marching your way to join GAWSOME. Indicating that GAW hasn't even received their miners yet.

GAW was selling hashrate months prior to this confirmation.

[rokkyroad]

Shit like this is why its so hard to accomplish anything in this damn industry, we spend more time researching and doin diligence than we do mining and profiting. Why the hell do so many assholes take this industry as a scammers paradise, no matter if its FUD morons or the actual scammers themselves. I just wish there was some kind of virus that attacked scammers and would eliminate them.

I have been looking into GAW for a while was even very interested they were doing a coin, and now look, I dont know who to believe the OP or the GAW lovers posting here, I hope the OP is wrong as I have a few friends heavily invested in GAW.

I hear you.

The altcoin scene is a cesspool no doubt.  

You got to break out the scales when looking for something to invest in. Should I invest in the smart kid's ICO(Etheriem for example) with grandeur promises or no promises at all(etheriem) OR a bonafide company with real assets making grandeur promises? Who is the most likely to produce something?

We all know someone is going to hit a home run.

Is Gaw big enough, rich enough, and smart enough to be first to market with their shit together?
If they pull off what they are promising, well ... who knows ... could be a real game changer.

Its all a gamble. Roll the dice. There is always the entertainment value.

[jbreher]

"Josh Garza @gawceo  ·  22h 22 hours ago
We had a detailed review by a highly respected 3rd party today. They reviewed our wallets and mining center information. Public next week!"

Indistinguishable from a Ponzi's last pump. Not sayin' it necessarily is a Ponzi's last pump, but I am just sayin'.

Wait for this and then eat your own words.

Perhaps. We'll see soon enough.

[Phildo]

Bitmain confirmed that they have bought over 5 petahash from them https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=827552.msg9378239#msg9378239

Keep on making shit up though bro

Aren't you making a false dichotomy here? Since 5 Petahashes represents a fraction of their total hashing power is it not a real possibility they are selling a percentage of fractional virtual hashes as a ponzi scheme?

https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/gavin-andresen-suspects-ponzi-schemes-bitcoin-cloud-mining/

What would the point of that be? If they were to operate a ponzi scheme then they would just take funds from customers to buy the hashlets to payout the mining revenue, there would be no need to buy actual mining equipment. Also the 5 PHs represents the additional mining capacity they are purchasing, not their existing capacity (5 PHs is ~1.8% of the total network).

In regards to the controversy over their new altcoin, I don't see why people can't wait a little while to see who exactly will accept it as payment.

The point would be to spend a little money to make a lot more money.

Shit, Pirate put 5,000 coins in escrow on a bet that he wasn't running a ponzi. That publicity made him so much money that he probably didn't give a shit when that bet got paid out.

[maildir]

"Josh Garza @gawceo  ·  22h 22 hours ago
We had a detailed review by a highly respected 3rd party today. They reviewed our wallets and mining center information. Public next week!"

Wait for this and then eat your own words.

Everything is "next week", "soon", "in awhile" with this operation always in the hopes everyone will forget or they will throw out some brand new incredible idea to make everyone forget. So where are the interviews with Fortune and CNN guaranteed to appear this week, since last week? 3 PH of machines represents 5000 individual units. 5000 Bitmain miners. Call it 10,000 machines. Think about the logistics of that packing moving to the US unpacking and setting up in that mysterious warehouse of theirs in the US versus, leaving them in China and just renting the power and simply claiming they have and own the hardware. What do you suppose can take another week for some highly-respected 3rd party to simply upload some photos and make a simple blog, an hour after inspecting all of this? Let me guess, highly-respected 3rd party is being flown to China where Bitmain has roped off a sector that looks like 5 PH worth of hashing power and a big nicely made sign that says "Josh's Miners".

All under MNDA of course where a single sentence will be offered next week I have seen them and here are some incredibly grainy photos proving so.

[Snipe85]

People are so butthurt about GAW that they are going into the extremes of laughing at their frontman's looks, religion, education, pointing out his grammar mistakes and so on. I never invested in any cloud mining, but all this hate and low punches directed at this guy make me feel sympathy for him.

[maildir]

Hey that's nice to know. Thanks for sharing!

[Puppet]

I keep looking over claims and sometimes proof, posative and negative, about the validity of GAW and can not seem to draw a definitive conclusion. However, I've been here long enough to see that where there is smoke there is usually fire, and not the sporadic, easily refuted, measly little puffs of smoke raised by every other troll in here who are guaranteed to attack every single offering and new coin no matter what, NO! I mean prolonged huge plumes of thick black smoke coming from every sub and let out by known trusted bitcointalk users with blatant smoking guns lying all over the place... that is what GAW looks like.

Maybe I'm wrong and I will have to bear the unthinkable shame of having a few 12 yr old basement dwelling trolls to call me a poopy-head etc. but who cares? Type "GAW" into the search bar up in the top right of this page...you will not like what you see.

Be safe, not sorry. Sit back and watch GAW, but do not invest. That is what I am doing. The potential for profit is tiny, the potential for total loss is so big I cant see around it.

My thoughts exactly. Its clear they have some kind of operation going, its equally clear they are making lots of claims that are highly dubious if not flatout untrue.
Its impossible to me to judge how far the deception goes, which is reason enough never to invest in it.

[EvilPanda]

Recently the CEO of GAW Miners claimed publicly that the company and he personally have sealed up partnerships and deals with Target, Amazon, and Walmart about the coin and the company.
( -> not a single proof about that claim. )
Coin Fire has learned these recent claims are stretching the truth or outright lies.

And what proof has coinfire provided to support this claim? I haven't seen a proof of the CEO saying this.