You think research is all you need to avoid scams? I bet you people who didn't research put money into EOS for example and they all thought they were geniuses for investing in such a big opportunity.
And those who researched in 2018 and 2019 probably all lost money. Whitepapers, teams, companies. All existed and all legit but so what? In the end, ICOs scam when they want to, either forwardly or in a "legitimate" way.
Very true unfortunately. Also most of businesses go down even without founders going rogue. It's just hard to run a company and especially in this environment. If add basically endless possibilities of running away with money then you get some sad picture of the reality.