Topic: Be safe: READ THIS BEFORE TRADING/BUYING/USING YOUR MONEY - page 3. (Read 291930 times)

My money were stolen from Bittrex


Hello everyone!

Maybe, someone can help me.

My funds were stolen from Bittrex. I had 42.000 USDT, and there was an API key (without access to withdrawal, and there were no key changes), also there was two factor authentication on my Bittrex account and on email (from which the there is a login confirmation for every new IP).

The API key is set only to read and trade access.

A person was added for managing the deposit. After about a day I logged in to see that from my 42.000 USDT balance only 70 USDT left, but there were no history of money withdrawal. However, when I checked the orders, I saw 32 pages of instant underpriced sales. As I understand, a bot was creating these transactions, and another account was buying out my money for close to zero value. As a result, all of my money ended up on another account, from which they were withdrawn.

Is it possible to do anything about this situation, and has anyone faced this kind of problem before?

At the time I wrote to the Bittrex support, bot only received the response, that the question was handed to the correspondent team.

Any advice how to start trading and what coin should I use?

Alright, so I've been PM'd by a few people what red-flags to look out for since I have a pretty good track record of spotting scammers. Sometimes I get it wrong, but better safe than sorry.  Here's a couple rules to follow to avoid becoming a victim:

1. Newbies, NEVER DO BUSINESS WITH OTHER NEWBIES, EVER. There are plenty of veteran members to do business with and ALWAYS use escrow. If you're a newbie and you're doing business with another newbie, there's nearly a 100% chance that one of the parties is a scammer. I can not stress this enough.. just work with people who have been here at least a year.
2. Always use escrow.
3. See rule #2.

1) Don't just trust the status of a member, anyone can be a hero member. This just means that he invested some time on his membership. He can always decide that a profitable scam will be a good payment for his time. However, a Hero account without negative feedback can be sold for more than 0.5 btcs. Therefore, he probably won't scam you for less than that, because a negative feedback from you would lower its value substantially.
2) Never deal with anyone without doing a search in the forum with his nickname, in order to check if he has scam accusations.
3) Ask for his coin address and always search it on http://blockchain.info, www.cryptocoinexplorer.com or other similar site, to verify if his address has the amounts he wants to sell.
4) Be very suspicious about proposals well under market price or if he accepts your proposal under market price with no negotiation.
5) Look for the reputation/trust of the member, checking also his successful trades, in the form of vouches from the other party on the deal. Be aware that positive trust can be forged by making and using more bitcointalk accounts and the trust system can be more or less avoided by changing its settings.
6) Even if he has some reputation, never send all the money in one transfer: send one first small tranche (ex. 0.05 btc) and wait for his payment. Send a second little higher tranche and wait again, etc. Small increments, because he might decide to pay you the first and second, to scam a bigger tranche. Always suspect if he doesn't accept to trade in small tranches, unless he has an excellent reputation.
7) If he has no reputation (specially if he is a newbie or Jr.), even small tranches are very risky. Better use an escrow system, like the one of www.btcrow.com, or a trusted member, or you might need to send more than 10 very small tranches. Think well before sending more than 0.15 btcs (it's considerable money in some countries) and only after 3 or 4 successful payments of 0.05 and 0.1 btcs.
8] For big amounts use an escrow system, unless the member has an excellent reputation. If he doesn't accept, forget the deal. Always protect your capital.
9) Only trade codes (ex. of virtual gift cards) with members with a very good reputation or using a very trusted escrow member that will have to go to the account and apply the code himself. The buyer will have to give the escrow person his password and change it again after. With an automatic escrow system, the buyer can claim falsely that the code was already redeemed when he received it or that his account was blocked after.
10) Don't sell any cryptocoin to paypal or other reversible system, unless the buyer has good reputation. The buyer can chargeback and, since it's against paypal's TOS to trade currency, paypal usually gives your money back to the buyer.


Here is a list of escrow members: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/escrow-list-108716

I am a newcomer. And I thank you for sharing so much. Indeed, this is a large mine, but not for everyone. Be careful, otherwise your effort will be poured into someone else's bag. I also agree that we should trust the veteran. Consult with them about choosing investment projects, selecting programs to receive rewards. And if you're not sure, ask a more experienced person to help out.

Alright, so I've been PM'd by a few people what red-flags to look out for since I have a pretty good track record of spotting scammers. Sometimes I get it wrong, but better safe than sorry.  Here's a couple rules to follow to avoid becoming a victim:

1. Newbies, NEVER DO BUSINESS WITH OTHER NEWBIES, EVER. There are plenty of veteran members to do business with and ALWAYS use escrow. If you're a newbie and you're doing business with another newbie, there's nearly a 100% chance that one of the parties is a scammer. I can not stress this enough.. just work with people who have been here at least a year.
2. Always use escrow.
3. See rule #2.