Jor almost lost a lot of BTC from a Signal scam \ stacker news ~bitcoin

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Jor almost lost a lot of BTC from a Signal scam youtu.be/8JkMaY9hdnI

1671 sats \ 56 comments \ @DarthCoin 11 Dec bitcoin

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Seems that somebody was impersonating BTC sessions. Yeah guys, Signal is so "secure"... from scams.

The guy who tried to scam me on orange club app also tried to move our conversation to signal, and he impersonated a fairly prominent bitcoiner. I wonder if this is a trend. Edit: Holy Shit! I just watched the video. This must be the same guy. I had the identical conversation two days ago. Same story. He claimed to be buying miners in Philadelphia, and just needed a loan for 24 hours. He impersonated someone I trusted.

136 sats \ 12 replies \ @itsrealfake 12 Dec

had the same scam experience about 2 years ago...

5 sats \ 11 replies \ @optimism 12 Dec

Would you say it's the same actor / shared playbook?

121 sats \ 10 replies \ @itsrealfake 12 Dec

just watching the video now...

when he says "signal which I consider to be the most private trusted app on my phone" I kinda lost all faith in his ability to think about security. signal's a web-connected honeypot.

don't get me wrong, I use it all day every day to communicate, because it's the best I've gotten my friends to adopt so far. I use it on my Mac too... so I'm no paragon of opsec.

but (I believe) signal is pwned, and has been for quite a while... probably since slightly before Moxie left the project.

Sounds like a similar actor/playbook.

I saved that person's Signal as "scammer" and a have since seen him show up in other btc groups. looks like his profile name published in Signal is "Rachel" right now

102 sats \ 9 replies \ @optimism 12 Dec

All your media gets uploaded to the cloud so they can log IPs - it doesn't really matter if they are compromised. Non-vpn signal usage is a big problem.

I'm going to need to rollover my old no-kyc prepaid t-mo number soon. And I haven't found a good non-kyc alternative that I can be sure of to persist for a while. So I'm trying to decide between alternate software that doesn't need a phone number, or doing more research.

100 sats \ 8 replies \ @Scoresby 12 Dec

I've had a silent.link esim that has persisted for three years now with only occasional use and topping up (at least once or twice a year).

It's their data only esim though, so can't speak to how persistent the number they offer are.

102 sats \ 7 replies \ @optimism 12 Dec

Is there a non-negligible cost to rolling your esim?

100 sats \ 4 replies \ @Scoresby 12 Dec

by "rolling" do you mean reinstalling the esim on a new device or topping it up?

I assume "rollover" in your previous comment meant you had to get a new number or a new esim.

in my case, I've been using the same esim and haven't been required to change it or buy a new one. Just send sats to an address and top it up when I need more data.

I may be misunderstanding your question though.

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100 sats \ 1 reply \ @itsrealfake 12 Dec

used silent.link for my trip to Japan. slightly expensive, but super effective.

haven't ever tried in the US

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69 sats \ 10 replies \ @optimism 11 Dec

I already suggested the 4 words to use when someone asks you for 10M sats the other day, lol.

136 sats \ 4 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

the whole thing with the video is also a bit suspicious... Not even to my closest irl fiend will give 10M sats just like that by a chat... something is not smelling good with this video. I post it just for fun.

136 sats \ 3 replies \ @optimism 11 Dec

I think that there are many people that will fall for this shit, because they "trust" technology that is said to be secure. But security is a process.

100 sats \ 2 replies \ @siggy47 11 Dec

You might be right. I'm sure people who fall for it feel humiliated and don't talk about it. I'm wondering how often it is successful.

136 sats \ 0 replies \ @optimism 11 Dec

It's very humiliating, but it's useful to talk about it. As you see we've now uncovered a pattern because people talked about it, so thanks for doing that. Collaborative threat identification is extremely powerful.

136 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

I'm wondering how often it is successful.

many times unfortunately... You cannot imagine how many people are contacting me in private to tell me that they were scammed... is really sad, and I cannot do too much for them. Some of them I rescued right on time, but some of them was too late.

198 sats \ 4 replies \ @siggy47 11 Dec

He must have known I was a shrimp, not a whale. He asked me for a lot less than he asked Jor. I'm insulted 😀

114 sats \ 1 reply \ @Aeneas 11 Dec

"I'd like to borrow 100 sats for 24 hours, just to get my miner in Philadelphia set up..."

3 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

yeah that crack me up... wtf, you still don't see the scam?

36 sats \ 1 reply \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

buahahahaha Always play the "poor guy" card...

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 12 Dec

@DarthCoin does not use Bitcoin wallet on Stacker News. @DarthCoin is deliberately boycotting BTC MoE on Stacker News. Boycott @DarthCoin as long as he maintains this gross hypocrisy.

136 sats \ 6 replies \ @optimism 11 Dec

Re: edit. That's what I thought. It's just a bunch of kids with a call list. What you should worry about is how you got on the list.

133 sats \ 2 replies \ @siggy47 11 Dec

I'm not sure what it costs to join Club Orange, but it's kind of a high bar just to run a failed scam and get barred from the site. Whoever did it must have been confident in his abilities to make that investment. I'm not so sure it's just kids.

136 sats \ 1 reply \ @optimism 11 Dec

Kids are often being recruited by syndicates - like the ones operating the scam compounds in Myanmar. They are vulnerable, uncertain and want to make a quick buck. The investment is not done by the person you talked with.

136 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

This reminds me of this Hacked podcast episode, talking about this scenario

https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/hacked-29408/episodes/the-sim-farm-269335802

136 sats \ 2 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

What you should worry about is how you got on the list.

very few even think about... Because they still do not know how to separate the public from private.

33 sats \ 1 reply \ @Aeneas 11 Dec

Because they still do not know how to separate the public from private.

This is one of the smartest things you mention in your guides, by the way. It would go a long way toward stopping incidents like the OP if people implemented it.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

I asked this question here on SN and seems that few people know the answer about who is "darthcoin" #1251738

57 sats \ 3 replies \ @Machiavelli23 11 Dec

I was just thinking about downloading the orange club app to try to connect with other Bitcoiners near me but is the alternative more dangerous? Should I not download it?

56 sats \ 0 replies \ @Aeneas 11 Dec

This can happen literally anywhere you interact with people, even SN or Nostr.

57 sats \ 1 reply \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

The app in itself is not dangerous... the people that are also joining and trying to scam you are the problem. Scammers will always be everywhere, so just stay vigilant. If something doesn't smell right, then is a scam and you have options to report them.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @siggy47 11 Dec

Exactly.

36 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

impersonating is a real danger but also education how to deal with these cheap scam is required. I never got scammed on chat messenger because I simply tell them to fuck off (Darth's style) and my messengers are very well controlled and limited.

257 sats \ 8 replies \ @optimism 11 Dec

Settings -> Privacy -> Phone number -> Who can find me by number -> Nobody.

No more scammers.

100 sats \ 7 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

basic steps for all chat msgnrs. But i think in this case was something else because he says that was contacted by a trusted user not a random.

100 sats \ 4 replies \ @siggy47 11 Dec

I think the scammer impersonated the trusted user too. That's what happened with me.

136 sats \ 3 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

That means orangepill app have a flaw. On TG for example, you can easily see the userID that is not the same, even that they put in the bio same user name...

Sometimes I just try to scam the scammers and send them a LN invoice of 100k sats to pay before I will start talking.

100 sats \ 1 reply \ @siggy47 11 Dec

Good point. I asked Matt about that. You can't distinguish a real account from an impersonator.

36 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

unique ID in TG

Then you can use Rose bot to block any scammer. So your online life is so quiet and clean of scammers.

36 sats \ 0 replies \ @optimism 11 Dec

send them a LN invoice of 100k sats to pay before I will start talking.

This made me cry laughing lol

100 sats \ 1 reply \ @optimism 11 Dec

Yes, his friend introduced the scammer haha.

100 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

buahahaha BTC sessions

56 sats \ 3 replies \ @Aeneas 11 Dec

Suspicious or not, it is completely true that the "mind has no firewall." Bad actors want to catch you acting without thinking—and how the fuck can any security protect you from pressing send yourself?

Everyone thinks they would "never" do that, but people will do anything if the narrative in their mind makes it the logical conclusion. The point of social engineering is precisely to weave that narrative so that you fuck up irreversibly.

That said, this is easy to avoid when you control who can access you and where: it would be kind of weird for "Mom" to be writing to you from Nostr.

19 sats \ 0 replies \ @SHA256man 12 Dec

a useful strategy, especialy in the age of AI, is to verify the identity of the entity pinging u thru one or two additional medium(s): physical, digital, or virtual (see: digital vs virtual);

simple example: a friend's mother got called by an impersonator of her son, who said "mom, i got into an accident, i am in a hospital, i need money for a lawyer;" luckily, the father called the son directly on his other phone before the distraught mother sent the funds over;

3 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin OP 11 Dec

good points

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @itsrealfake 12 Dec

"mind has no firewall."

useful heuristic, but I think it's contrary to the statement "it's hard to convince somebody of something in conflict with how they get their paycheck"

22 sats \ 0 replies \ @SHA256man 12 Dec

bitcoin users who still have a fiat-trapped mindset will continue to lose access to bitcoin; scammers, whether individuals or state-level corporations, excel at exploiting people's desire to make money; this duping wil continue as long as the god of money remains strong in people's minds; the religion of money is the strongest tool of control in the world! money does not exist in physical reality, only in the minds of men;