I'm not sure how many people use IRC, I never did before I joined crypto so best practices were hard to grasp. Seems like a group or lone wolf is going to popular crypto channels writing down user names then Private Messaging random users asking for trades. The guy asking for trades is never authed and so far as always looked like this
TL;DR I've seen some scamming on IRC channels lately and everyone needs to be careful.
Protect yourself:
~Verify who your dealing with, most everyone auths themselves. google how to claim your username in irc if you havent.
~If you see something, say something. Report any suspiscous talk to your channel mods.
~Do not engage in Off exchange trading. theres no reason someone would want to offer you extra money for nothing special. tell them to go make an account on any exchange and buy the coin themselves. People have gotten scammed even with attempted escrow (your scammer will be nice enough to provide escrow into his bitcoin address should you ask it seems)
I've noted him spotted in:
#sapience 25 users
#shadowcash 130 users
#URO 110 users
I've been in channels when hes struck. it sucks knowing whatever you just sent is not coming back. please be careful with your coins.