Last week I sent my subscribers an email asking them what they wanted to hear about most ? I gave them 3 options:
- How to access the deep web (my personal favorite)
- The top Bitcoin scams from the last year
- Top 10 presents to get to a Bitcoin lover
From the title of this post you can guess which option won. And it was a pretty clear win as well, here are the results:
So without further ado please welcome the top 4 Bitcoin scams from the past 12 months:
NEO & BEE (March 2014)
Within one month of conception, N&B, initially believed by many to be a promising bitcoin start up, vanished from the surface of the earth with its CEO Danny Brewster still being on the hide with an arrest warrant issued for him for serious criminal charges. The company raised over 9,400BTC and launched one of the most aggressive Bitcoin marketing campaigns ever.
Moolah’s missing funds (October 2014)
Moolah LTD, the digital payments service provider was shut down on October 2014 after becoming insolvent. If you read the CEO’s last blog post you’ll see that it’s not so much a scam as it is negligence – Apparently the company just ran out of cash. Previously Moolah has acquired the altcoin exchange Mintpal after it lost almost $2m in customer funds. There is no report on how much money was lost in Moolah’s bankruptcy but it’s estaimted in several million dollars.
Hong Kong BTC exchange MyCoin Disappears with up to HK$75m (February 2015)
Presumably one of the largest exchanges to close shop MyCoin is also suspected of being a pyramid scheme. Customers were never presented with receipts and were led to deposit their newly-acquired coins at a separate site to earn interest. Also promises were made of cash prizes or Mercedes-Benz cars if customers could recruit new investors. Until today only 5 people were arrested in this case.
For the full story on South China Morning Post
Evolution disappears with $12m (March 2015)
The dark web’s marketplace Evolution which became to go-to website for drugs after SilkRoad was shut down and the money deposited in it never returned. Since most of the details about Evolution are not visible on the “normal” web it’s hard to get more information on this specific matter. There was also a bounty put on the heads of Evolution admins on Reddit by some angry users but it was quickly removed.
For the full story on The Guardian
Next week we’ll cover how to access the deep web so be sure to stay tuned.
Has Bitrend appeared on your radar as a scam?