Topic: Should I be worried? (Read 385 times)

Glad that you saw it worked out. Unfortunately, using most online services or exchanges like Poloniex means that you have to give up control over your own funds. As achow explains, the balances you see on your accounts are just database entries on their servers updated as you deposit to and withdraw from their wallets.

I use some of these exchanges, when I want to use my Bitcoins to buy other alts - in reality, I am sending them my bitcoins, and when I perform a trade on their exchange, I am credited with the corresponding amount of altcoins. I only regain control of those alts when I request a withdrawal and they send me those alts to a wallet I control. So... yes, when we used these centralised exchanges, we are sending them our funds for the promise of that they will be returned to us when we make withdrawals.

Currently, there is a way to remain fully in control of your funds while still exchanging, through so-called decentralised exchanges. These are platforms where users offer trades to and accept trades from each other, P2P exchanging/trading. The only issues now are that they are only a few of them with a small userbase, therefore, fewer trades with fewer alts and with less volume, as well as a slightly more complex method of completing trades. You can check out two that I am using now:
1. https://wavesplatform.com/
2. https://xcpdex.com/

There are a few more in development which I hope will give us the same access and volume as Poloniex, Bittrex and others. It will be a long wait, though.

Thank you to all users buwaytress and jackg, for your helpful responses, yes I finally understood that I only had to not worry as the balances had no issues later on when I made withdrawals, it came from a new and different address. But, it finally arrived in my own address, which is the main concern saved.

To user achow101, you say that these are not my addresses but those of the exchanges. Have there been any exchanges who have not honoured their promises to withdraw the funds of users? If so, then I believe users must be warned of such possibilities as when I signed up for Poloniex, there was no mention of anything like them controlling my funds. Could you explain how I can own the addresses that I use for Poloniex to secure myself?

No thus is completely normal. Nothing to worry about. You actually just send the bitcoin to a deposit address that is linked to your account. Then it's the bitcoin is moved to other wallets that will allow it to be traded for other altcoins.

you said you balance was on poloniex site, them dont worry.

Maybe they have an internal wallet management software that move your coins to other wallet in their system...

Contrary to popular belief, the addresses that an exchange (including Poloniex) gives you to deposit your coins into are not your addresses. You do not control those addresses and those are not part of a wallet that is yours. Rather what that is is the exchange is giving you an address from their wallet, and you are depositing coins into their wallet. They then update an entry in their databases that says that your account has a certain balance. All it means is that they promise to send up to that many coins to another address if you request it. Otherwise the money is really theirs and they can do whatever they want with it.

As long as your balance in the exchange is still the same then you are safe.
Elaborating on what buwaytress said, your address is specific to you, however, this is an online address and if an exchange as large as poloniex left all coins on nodes with internet access then they would be a lot easier to hack than offline addresses. Therefore, automatic scripts run on their nodes to ensure your deposit is first counted and then the coins from that address are stored offline (usually in a printed paper wallet once an address has got enough coins in it - depending on what the threshold is).

Hey there! The way you've described what happened means you likely have nothing to worry about.

1. You said your Poloniex account shows your balance. So this is all you need to worry about. If it's there, it's fine. The balances reflected on your account aren't the same as the actual coins on the addresses. They're just a total of what you've deposited/earned/traded in and out.

2. Most, if not all, exchanges like Poloniex (in fact, any site for that matter) automatically empty out your unique deposit addresses into their own wallets. It's just a security measure for them.

Hello, I hope someone can help. I recently opened a new account an an trading website: Poloniex.com. Before this, I only made an account for Bitcoins using a immediate card purchase and kept it all on a online wallet. Yesterday, I made a withdrawal from the wallet into my Poloniex account and paid all the fees etc. And today I checked, the wallet is empty. And I checked my Poloniex and the amount it there. BUT this is the problem:

When I checked the address I sent to, the blockchain shows that all the money I sent there is GONE, sent to someone else. I have sent a support to stop it before confirmation but does anyone know what I can do?