Crypto Scams

Cryptocurrency

Cryptocurrency has been around for over 20 years. This form of currency has made a lot of waves since its inception. Cryptocurrency is one kind of currency that has risen from barely anything to one upon which almost the whole world depends.

The creation of Bitcoin (cryptocurrency) was at a time when the world was witnessing a downtime in the global economic situation. The cryptocurrency was created to fill the gap of the third party to investment activities. The reason investors wanted no third party was that Banks were the intermediary between investors and their investments at that time. The creation of Bitcoin (the first cryptocurrency) solved that challenge; cryptocurrency came as a peer-to-peer form of currency exchange at the time of its creation.

Safe and secure?

There is a feature of the cryptocurrency called the pseudonymous function. This feature is one of the unique features of the creation of the cryptocurrency. The pseudonymous feature allows investors to make investments using cryptocurrencies and maintain an anonymous identity.

The rise of the age has witnessed a surge in the amount of cryptocurrency trading activities present in the world. The crypto market has not gone unnoticed by scammers and con artists who take advantage of people and their funds. Over the past few years, there’s been a global trend of crypto scams.

This article will show some of the new trends of crypto scams. It will also show some of the old methods as well as some of the modified ones. It is easy for scammers to get away with cryptocurrency scams, and this is because of the pseudonymous design of cryptocurrencies. When anyone is scammed of their cryptocurrency, it is hard to trace their funds.

How It Works

Cryptocurrency Scam Trends Of

Below are some of the scam methods used by scammers to deprive people of their crypto assets in recent times. It would be wise to use some of these methods to your advantage in protecting yourself against these scammers. It is to be noted that many cryptocurrency scam schemes generally have a note of urgency. Scam investments come with the kind of haste that would make the investor feel as if cryptocurrency investments will end the next minute. The hastiness in the tone of cryptocurrency scams makes it feel as if the investor will lose a once in a lifetime opportunity. When it doesn’t sound urgent, crypto scams usually promise almost impossible returns; these kinds of returns are so high one would think it a disservice to oneself not to invest in such opportunities, but lo and behold it is a scam. Please watch out for some of these things in your crypto investment engagements.

Fake investment platforms

Because of the steep rise in the price of Bitcoin, many may not be able to afford to buy a substantial unit of the leading cryptocurrency asset. This rise in the value of Bitcoin has caused many young investors to look away from the top asset to new and prospective ones. There are many cryptocurrency assets in the world now, and some of them are recent, but not all that shines is gold. Many investors prefer to go for the new cryptocurrency inventions because they believe these currencies would raise the ladders just like the Bitcoin in a short time.

Many people look for ways to insure their future using cryptocurrencies, and scammers have taken advantage of this to the disadvantage of many investors. What these con artists promise is a new crypto investment platform with a new kind of cryptocurrency with returns that sound out of the world. As simple as this sounds, many have fallen; millions of dollars have been lost to fake investment platforms. These scammers create a website platform for people to send investments; as a matter of fact, no one would think it a scam until he or she has been scammed.

When an unsuspecting investor visits the scam website, he/ she makes donations for investments, and some even advertise these things to family members who also make further donations. The trend goes on and on like that. The investors will one day get to the website and see that it is closed with no trace of its administrators.

The best way to steer clear of this kind of fraudulent scam is to make proper research of the sort of cryptocurrency in which one intends to invest. The government does not regulate cryptocurrency, so it is hard for any government to track down the perpetrators of these kinds of acts; it is left for you as the investor to seek a way out of this menace. Before placing your funds or data on any new cryptocurrency trading platform, be sure to make proper findings of the asset, its administrators, its returns, et cetera. And be sure the returns promisedare not arbitrary.

Scam malware

The trick of this kind of scam is using one’s browsing and internet usage against a person. The method involves sending a person to a website that has malware infection programmed to steal the funds of an unsuspecting investor. Once an investor visits such a site, he/ she is exposed to a kind of pre-programmed malware. A sidest aking the funds of the investor, the malware can change the details of the user’s crypto wallet such that the details of the portfolio will become that of the scammer. A malware can deprive an investor totally of his/ her funds. As such, one must be very careful with the kinds of links one click on the internet, especially for people that have cryptocurrency wallets funded online.

Scammers of this category are quite subtle and almost unnoticeable in their ways because they hide in the most unnoticeable of places. It would take more than just watching out to steer clear of this kind of scam. Staying safe from this kind of fraud requires cautious scrutiny of every single link one clicks on the internet. As a golden rule, it is better to focus on the things one sets out to do on the internet, check the verified websites you desire to check, and leave the internet. Be careful of the ad links you click, if possible, keep off ads totally, and when you do click on ads, be sure to clear your browsing cookie history, as malware sometimes hides in them.

The internet is a vast world, and so are cryptocurrency assets. Every cryptocurrency investor must take every little bit of precaution to guard against scams from malware.

Cryptocurrency ponzi schemes

Ponzi schemes have existed for long, and from the look of things, they are not likely to be eradicated anytime soon. Crypto Ponzi schemes involve a body or an organization asking people to make crypto investments and invite others. The investor gets a portion of the stakes of the other investors he/ she invites. This system itself may not be a scam, but it becomes one when the platform pays old investors with the funds of the new ones, leaving the question: who pays the new investors? The end of such schemes is always the closure of such platforms. When such platforms are closed, their closure leaves the investors out in the blue. MiningMax is one of many of such platforms. MiningMax accumulated about two hundred million dollars before it was shut down. About fourteen persons are being persecuted for this action, but as expected, the investors never got their funds again.

Please be sure to confirm the validity of a platform before committing any funds to it (crypto or otherwise).

Extortion and blackmail

This scam method involves the con artist sending an email or a message to his/ her victim claiming to have something that can be used against the victim. Scammers of this category make claims to have nude pictures of their victims, a history of the victim visiting pornography sites, and other embarrassing items or circumstances which can demean a person in public. In the bid to avoid embarrassment, the victim sends whatever the scammer requests, and sometimes these requests come in the form of cryptocurrency. The reason scammers prefer cryptocurrencies is because of the pseudonymous feature of a cryptocurrency.This feature of anonymity will help them to remain untraceable in their shady dealings.

The best safeguard against this kind of scam is to be careful with what one does on the internet. Just like in the real world, where there are thieves and burglars, there are scammers and hackers on the internet as well. These con artists are out for anyone against whom they can hold anything.

Conclusion

There are scammers everywhere on the internet nowadays, and because of the unregulated nature of cryptocurrency, these scammers are out to work against anyone they can. Please be on your guard at all times on the internet. Do not send pictures or personal contents on unverified networks, as those kinds of things can fall into the hands of scammers. Don’t share your passwords or PIN codes on links that you’re not sure of their sources; it may be a way to get into your cryptocurrency wallet, don’t share your cryptocurrency wallet address except it is necessary.

Cryptocurrency investment is a very good one; one just has to find a way to steer clear of these con artists.