Topic: Ways to identify ICO scams (Read 694 times)
Never give any value to an ICO based on it's concept or because of the nice face of it on the website. The Best thing is have a Research on the profiles of whole ICO Team. Their history is highly important. Than have a look what ICO Rating sites are thinking about the ICO. What are the opinions of the community is also highly important. Never be shy to ask the questions from the Team.
Actually everybody he cant identify a scam project because ones I've been scam you can't identify totally if this project are scam or not,maybe you can try search who is the campaign manager and also I can check this campaign if legit or not.
It's not so easy to identify a scam project, but I guess you should not be tempted by big bonuses. The first thing i watch is always the team, their experience, results etc. Also you can search different analyzes of this project. It`s great if a project is added to different sites about ICOs and have been rated by experts. Also pay attention to its popularity. A project can be fine but if no one cares about it, then it will be much harder for this project to achieve great results.
Certain scam schemes related to ICO campaigns might use a duplication methodics.
A real case emerged.
Agrotechfarm ATF cannabis project is a classical scam( agrotechfarm.com)
Here is a typical example.
1. Hustlers detect one of ongoing innovative projects (FIBONACCI.FARM) manufacturing home agro appliances for strawberry cultivation.
2. The scam artists pretending distributors/cutomers purchased several FIBONACCI appliances. Bingo, now they have real appliances presenting as they own technologies.
3. All content is illegaly taken from the corporate fibonacci.farm site. A classical copyright infringement case.
5. Then they create own ICO site (Agrotechfarm.com) presenting themselves as experienced agronomists who composed a unique agro solution for cannabis growing.
6. ATF official ICO-pre sale launched , transactions made and finally they are grabbing investors funds. Marks are robbed, funds are sent to offshore bank account located in Cyprus.
7. Desperate Hustlers are searching for the next attractive start-up to repeat a scam scheme again.
8. Again
9. And again.....
A real case emerged.
Agrotechfarm ATF cannabis project is a classical scam( agrotechfarm.com)
Here is a typical example.
1. Hustlers detect one of ongoing innovative projects (FIBONACCI.FARM) manufacturing home agro appliances for strawberry cultivation.
2. The scam artists pretending distributors/cutomers purchased several FIBONACCI appliances. Bingo, now they have real appliances presenting as they own technologies.
3. All content is illegaly taken from the corporate fibonacci.farm site. A classical copyright infringement case.
5. Then they create own ICO site (Agrotechfarm.com) presenting themselves as experienced agronomists who composed a unique agro solution for cannabis growing.
6. ATF official ICO-pre sale launched , transactions made and finally they are grabbing investors funds. Marks are robbed, funds are sent to offshore bank account located in Cyprus.
7. Desperate Hustlers are searching for the next attractive start-up to repeat a scam scheme again.
8. Again
9. And again.....
now it is most likely not possible, if personally not familiar with the organizers ... 90 percent of fraud ... just collecting money. if earlier it was possible to create funds to help sick children or save the dying Bengal tigers .... now a new trend, to come up with an unknown company to collect money for it and disappear)
Now it's quite difficult to identify scam, because people have learned to very seriously hide themselves and their projects, so perhaps this is simply impossible, unless of course paying attention to any little things, people still get smart on their mistakes.
it's very difficult to know a project if it's a scam but if they offer you more than you can earn it it is because that's the way scams are now tempted if you are too big in a project, preferably moderate your income is more than a scam.
Guys, do share your tips on how to identify scams. To widen the knowledge for people who are honestly trying to invest and gain earnings with their hard earn money!
To find out if an ICO is a scam or not, you must first check their team members and verify if they really are the real deal and not just a one-person team who uses other people's picture and information and pretend to be them just to scam.
Next, see if the ICO is transparent when it comes to contribution. You should see the amount they receive from their investors on their main page. This is important for investors and participants as this would provide them a report on how much the ICO had raised from their crowdfunding campaign. If the project, say, hasn't raised enough amount to cover for their soft capital, it is automatic that the contribution of the investors will be returned to them and the ICO will not proceed as planned.
Thirdly, every project must have their smart contract available in a repository, e.g. Github or Sourceforge. Even without a whitepaper if an ICO has their codes and summary set and shown in a repository, then that is enough to testify for their project legitity.
And of course, finally, they should have an escrow for the contribution. Investing in an ICO is a risky venture, however, the risk may be minimized if the contributions are handled by a third-party who will create the smart contract to secure the funds for the crowdfunding event.
In summary, an ICO should have an escrow, transparent when it comes to contributions, can be verified, has an available repository, etc. If you do not see or verify any of the above mentioned, then it will be up to your personal discretion if you still want to invest in them or not.
I've been scammed many times and I still find very difficult to identify if the bounty is scam. The things I always put on my mind now when finding bounty is I will not based on promised bonus and I find trusted campaign manager.
All about ICO will be clarified in white papers, official websites, social media, and discussion forums. and dev immediately responds to questions clearly, and is consistent in answering and easily understood is a sign that the ICO is really honest. if one of these, chances are the ICO is a scam
In assessing the ICO need to ask the question: is it really necessary startup blockchain and its own token? If in both cases the answer is "no", it is likely that the project — just empty and in fact does not perform any useful function.
read white paper, their team, concept and their directions.
This is why i am skeptical with investing in ICO's I've heard that some can be a scam, but on the other hand i've also seen others do very well.
First is to check if the fundamental of the coins you are looking at, I mean on that way you can easy identify if the ICO really means business or to be direct i am pertaining to it's feasibility in the market. Second is to check the background of the team. Are they new on the business, check their reputation and do your research about them. Are they involve in previous scams?, and after that if you really validate them, check the project itself the mechanics the whitepaper and the roadmap itself will help you determine if it's a scam or not. By this way you can figure out what will be the possible future of an ICO.
you need to read the whitepaper and understand it first. See whether their concept is important and realistic. Check about their dev team. Are they real? Join social media channels and ask questions and see reviews. Ask from experts in investing.
Study carefully the team, who these people are, whether they are real names and contacts, as well as advisors, see if the project has already passed the pre-settlement how many funds were raised. Pay attention also to bonuses, if they are too big this should also alert. Read certainly more independent sources
Best way to identify if the ICO is scam is to read their whitepaper. You can easily determine because it is obvious that they are setting some kind of weird goals. And base on my experience,some scam ICOs only get their pictures of their developers in the internet. They randomly pick some pictures of businessmen and women. When you search for the name of the developer,you'll find out they don't exist. Another thing is,they dont reveal the contacts of the proponents, they're hiding it from the public so that no one can contact it because obviously,it is fake.
make sure the legal document is publicly accessible and the data is valid
make sure the team and developers have a public profile, such as LinkedIn,
note the total suply, project type, project area coverage makes sense
be sure to use Smart Contract or Escrow in fundraising
make sure the team and developers have a public profile, such as LinkedIn,
note the total suply, project type, project area coverage makes sense
be sure to use Smart Contract or Escrow in fundraising
look out for these three things.
1. The Developers Are Anonymous or not
2. The Token does not have a clear use case or just normal idea bought from somewhere else
3. The Whitepaper Sets Unrealistic Goals
1. The Developers Are Anonymous or not
2. The Token does not have a clear use case or just normal idea bought from somewhere else
3. The Whitepaper Sets Unrealistic Goals
I agree 100% with 1.
This is pretty much on point. Even if you see some pictures of devs sometimes those people don't exist or they're stock photos of random people pulled from various websites.
Someone above said "join their telegram" but that's actually beginning to be where many scams actually take place these days.
I say look at maybe Linked In connections, see what other contact details are out there. Look at the start of the project, the questions answered, see if they've attended any live events, see the attendees to said event etc.
Also suggest facebook and twitter accounts to make connections. Also what are they offering and why are they doing an ICO?
in my opinion determining the scam project is to browse the developer. Avoid promising great advantages to us. Check the social media it has, whether the post is always new, and its members are often active. Avoid projects run by new people as project managers. Use telegram, join their telegram. Telegram will provide quick information about the project being followed.
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