Risks
Clones
The fake is not a bad copy. It is the same page, on a different address, reached through a link you did not choose — an advert, a search result, a pinned message.
19 Oct 2026 8 min
Check and protect Before you send anything, and after something went wrong.
Risks
Most losses in crypto are not sophisticated. They repeat the same handful of shapes, and every one of them is recognisable in advance. This section is the checklist, then the patterns that account for most of the money — and, if something has already happened, the page that starts with what you did rather than what it was called.
In this section
- 10 guides
- 10 what-now paths
- 20 red flags
Linked from every page
Nobody legitimate will ever ask you for
Not once, not in an emergency, not to help you. There are no exceptions to this list.
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Your seed phrase or private key Not support, not a wallet developer, not an exchange, not the company that made your hardware wallet. There is no procedure anywhere that requires it. Anyone who asks is trying to rob you, and that is true without a single exception.
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A payment upfront to release, unlock or recover funds Legitimate platforms deduct fees from what they send you. A demand to pay before you can withdraw is the oldest pattern in this industry, and paying it produces a second demand rather than a withdrawal.
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A code from your SMS, email or authenticator app That code is the last thing standing between somebody and your account. Nobody legitimate needs to hear it, and support will never read it back to you.
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Remote access to your screen or your device "Let me just check the settings for you." Once they can see your screen, they can see everything you type, every tab you have open and every recovery phrase you copy.
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A "validation", "sync" or "migration" of your wallet There is no such maintenance procedure on any blockchain. The page exists to collect a signature or a phrase, and it will look exactly like the real thing.
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A code from a wallet page to "verify" or "sync" it Wallets are not verified, synchronised or migrated by anybody. Every page offering it collects a phrase or a signature, and it looks exactly like the software you use.
Promises that are not possible
Not unlikely, not risky — impossible. Nothing can produce these outcomes honestly.
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A fixed return per day, week or month Nothing that trades, lends or stakes can promise a fixed number, because none of those activities produce fixed results. A guaranteed percentage describes a payout schedule, and a payout schedule funded by deposits has one ending.
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Coins doubled if you send to an address first Every version of this has been theft, every time, for over a decade. It runs under borrowed names and verified-looking accounts, and the address never sends anything back.
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Recovery of funds you have already lost Anyone who contacts you offering to trace or recover stolen crypto is running the second scam on the same victim. Lists of people who have already lost money are bought and sold precisely for this.
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Returns that grow with how many people you introduce That is the definition of the structure, whatever the product on top is called. The maths does not care whether the front end is a trading bot, a mining pool or a game.
How they reach you
The approach is as recognisable as the request. These are the openings.
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A first message from support Real support responds; it does not initiate. Every unsolicited "support" contact in a chat group, a comment reply or a direct message is an impersonation, and the good ones copy the name and picture exactly.
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A deadline measured in minutes Urgency exists to stop you checking. Nothing legitimate expires while you verify it, and anything that does was not worth having.
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A link that arrives instead of one you looked up Type the address yourself or use your own bookmark. Search advertisements, pinned messages and reply-guys have all been used to serve convincing fakes of real sites.
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A move to a private channel Impersonators need you alone, where nobody can say "that is not the real admin". A helpful stranger who immediately wants to continue in private is not helping.
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Help that arrives after you lost money Investigators, lawyers, agencies and "compensation programmes" that contact victims first are the second theft. Everything that genuinely helps is free.
Before you put money on a platform
Four questions worth answering while it is still only a decision.
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No history anybody can verify A platform with no traceable record before this year, run by people nobody can name, is not a platform. It is a website, and websites close.
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Small withdrawals work, the large one does not This is the staged exit. Small amounts clear to build confidence, and the meaningful one triggers a surprise tax, an unlocking fee or a frozen account. The money was never going to leave.
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A token whose owner can mint, freeze or block selling All of that is readable on-chain before you buy. If nobody has read it, you are trusting a stranger's software with your money and no supervision at all.
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A balance you can see but have never withdrawn A number on a screen is what somebody chose to display. Test it by withdrawing everything, not a part — the answer arrives within a day and costs nothing.
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An address that matches at the start and the end Generating a lookalike is cheap, and it is planted in your own transaction history precisely so you copy it from there. Check the middle, or take the address from the source.
If a situation you are in matches any line above, stop and check it somewhere you navigated to yourself. Nothing here gets worse by waiting an hour.
The patterns behind most losses
Risks
Fake support
It is not sophisticated and it does not need to be. Somebody answers your question, and by the end of the conversation your wallet is empty.
19 Oct 2026 8 min
Risks
Giveaways that are not
The version that asks you to send first is a decade old and still running. The version that asks you to claim is newer, costs nothing to try, and empties the wallet instead.
19 Oct 2026 7 min
Risks
Wallet drainers
You never sent anything, and the wallet emptied anyway. This is what the approval you signed actually permitted.
19 Oct 2026 9 min
Risks
Address mistakes
Nobody types an address wrongly. They copy the right-looking one — from their own history, from a page that was rewritten, from a message. The result is identical and final.
19 Oct 2026 8 min
Risks
Account takeover
Most stolen crypto is not taken from wallets. It is withdrawn from accounts, by somebody who logged in normally, using codes that arrived on the victim's own phone.
19 Oct 2026 9 min
Risks
Ponzi in a mini app
It looks like a game, it pays out at first, and the arithmetic underneath has only one ending. Here is how to see it on day one.
19 Oct 2026 8 min
Risks
The long con
Weeks of ordinary conversation, then a platform that shows your balance growing. The balance is a number in somebody else's database, and the withdrawal fee is the product.
19 Oct 2026 10 min
Risks
If your funds are gone
An honest page. What is worth doing immediately, what recovery actually looks like, and why the person offering to help you is the next problem.
19 Oct 2026 7 min
Risks
The second scam
Within days of losing money, somebody offers to trace it. They know what happened to you because lists of victims are a product, and the offer is theft number two.
19 Oct 2026 8 min
Everything in Risks
The full map of this subject. Items without a link are being written.
Where this sits
The whole compendium is four groups. You are in the one marked below.