Fellow Steemians, I hope you'll unite with me to expose a group of bitcoin scammers using localbitcoin in New York.
Recently I was robbed for 15k cash from a localbitcoin.com scam. I had been dying to make a post about it, but the group of scammers were dumb enough to contact me again. There was potential of me getting my money back by having the police do a sting operation.
I'm a sailor so I had two phones, When the first scammer contacted me i called him from the phone I had planned on keeping the bitcoin on. I can't risk sailing and my bitcoin going overboard!.
Usually if I were to do a transaction this large in cash I would bring my Father who is 6, foot 7 and an absolute monster. Unfortunately the day before was my Mom's last day of chemo therapy. She was weak and he could not come. So I went alone.
I begged the police to let me give them cash to use during the sting operation but long story short they could not. All they could do is set up the sting and grab as many people involved and bring them in for questioning. Ultimately the police didn't have enough to make an arrest because with the sting since they didn't use any money no crime was actually committed. I was basically told there is a 99% chance i'll never get the money back.
Here are the pictures from the text messages the left side is scammer A and right side is B.
| Scammer A | Scammer B |
|---|---|
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Here are some signs that the BTC dealers youíre talking with could be scammers: - Both people contacted you via SMS
- They sent you a photo of their BTC balance both times on Blockchain.info
- Both images were the same dimensions
- BTC amounts were similar
- They people contacted me from VoIP phones in New York
- You can try baiting him into clicking a grabify link to get his ipÖ see if he is smart enough to not click
- Both removed the exif data from the wallet images they sent me.
- They Both claim to be a group that do multiple trades a day.
- They say you will meet with one of their salesmen.
- Both groups used the same address for a meet 15381 cross island pwky whitestone NY 11357
A list of addresses the second scammer proposed as meeting spots, so if anyone else gets text messages from a 929 number with these addresses beware.
152-59 10th Ave, Whitestone, NY
Bada Story 161-23 crocheron ave
Link to the images of wallets they sent me http://imgur.com/a/NkABU
Image of the original scammer on Pizza Chef's security cameras the cameras outside were conveniently pointed away.
As mentioned earlier if anyone wishes to donate STEEM I will be holding 100% of it. I don't blame crypto for this; Im very thankful for all the help I've received so far. I just hope that by sharing what happened to me, all of you can avoid this happening to you. Any donations are welcome, and will bring me further into crypto and Steem..
BTC: 12yMrA942sb2JdjRxFL9eBwUk5o3PmfB8G
Litecoin: LbgYvNMV8iMzKU15aD7kr1PviefDxCn5TF
ETH: 0xe21daac4ccef806b51c011872f167cedcaf2f7ba
STRAT: SaBsZgagL3q49CKekNo6C1ReD3gtz1aynr
Zcoin: a6AB2XMPp9QJjuipHd1gxc6kGDjhLEENXm
Dash: XhvoNvzkvUoJr57LK74zDCc8pG9ZNt8x9z
Thanks,
The Hulk!
Thanks for writing this, so others can learn from.
I am really sorry this happened to you.... :(
No problem I never want this to happen to someone else!
this how we know good people am very grateful to hear this form you
I don't get it. If you want to trade on localbitcoins for cash then you have to:
Also why don't you just pay the price the buyer states in the advertisment. You are exchanging far too many messages. Usually it takes a friendly "Hi, lets trade.." Ok, let's meet there. "
I think you made a trade outside of localbitcoins which is a no-go.
Was that your first trade? And then for 15000 dollar, are you nuts?
Edit: sorry for the "nuts" , I mean naive.
It wasn't my first trade, but since i had an ad up they contacted me via text message and claimed to not have accounts. And yes i was newer at the time but, smaller trades went well. Not with them with other peoople.
In the future, in regards to large bitcoin purchases...I would probably recommend Bitcoin ATMS's. If the purchase is around 10k - 20k , a lot of the bitcoin atm owners are cool with you just picking up the phone and contacting them. Check out my podcast...I talk about how to avoid the leeches, snakes, and rats. I give some good tips on what not to do. Lord knows I've been through it all.
Localbitcoins warns about that all over the place. Only accept trade throught the official channel. Don't change terms of trade. Check for reputation. To trade with people who do not have accounts is not the way to do it.
In my opinion you should not receive any reward for your posting. Edit: It looks like you are a scammer. Low reputation, no postings, and manyof your commenters have almost no reputation as well. You are putting LBC in a wrong light because you made all mistakes one can do.
When I finally got to the End. . .i noticed ..that a lot of addresses were placed. ..and yes...a little funny..but hey..get your Voice across and Welcome to steem where Being is Truth and only The Truth will Be Seen
@shla-rafia following you Broski
Nice post Shla. I was thinking the same thing. Lot's of red flags and mistakes made on this one. Tough lesson to learn at $15K. Buyer's beware...
Yes, I don't know what to think about it. Let's continue.
This post has received a 8.06 % upvote from @booster thanks to @thehulk.
Sorry to hear that and thanks for sharing.
One can never be too carefull... :-/
hey friend i m new in steemit whould you help to follow i will follow you back
sure
Hye @Hulk, this story is a reminder to everyone that there are bad people out there that have silver tongues and could charm thre tits off a cow ! Dont get milked ! I agree that this whole sale was unusual and i would never buy such an important some in this manner , when you are confronted with a total stranger with no visible means of identifying his real rep and credibility!! I am sure you will never repeat a similar scenario again !! bad luck !
good is good and bad is bad, I know you both and <3
Christ what a hit, sorry man. That's extremely heavy.
Thanks for the post and the warning. Don't be discouraged by people that don't want you to ask for help if you need it. THAT is what crypto-space is about (being able to do what you want, when you want, how you want -- mostly unregulated). I have friends and family that use that service often and this will be shared with them as well and it is surely worth more than my newbie 2cents. I will make a donation soon. Thanks again.
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this post by itself looks feels like a scam too ... asking for money come on !!!
I can assure you I was scammed for 15k, went up again on no sleep to sit and wait for it to possibly be the same guy while inside a cop car, I did throw donation links up. as i mentioned any steem i will keep here. Many know me around here and were there on discord after it happened. I can promise i am no scammer.
Please I am not questioning your being scammed What I say is that when you enter the market it is your OWN decision for such a reason assume the risks so you don't end up asking for money that is all.
This is open platform. People can do whatever they want to do. I'm the first to donate to people that I feel I can help -- that is my decision. I mean, I prefer people don't tell other people what to do and obviously, you like to tell people what to do or what risk should mean to them -- so let's just all do whatever we EACH want to do as INDIVIDUALS. If you want to help -- help -- if not, don't -- if you want to discourage, do that -- if I want to ignore your input or discouragement, I will. See, everyone's happy. Thanks for the warning @thehulk: your post may have saved ME and others from being SCAMMED and that is worth MORE than my current new 2cents here on Steemit (expect my donation).
Thanks Avva!
It isn't a scam. This post that is.
IF you lost 15k , who can blame, a lot of us know him and know the suffering inflicted by this.....upvoted, he is exposing the bad guys
no prob with exposing .... still the issue here is asking for help i.e. money .... when you play the market you gamble and do not, i say NEVER place all your eggs in one basket otherwise you end up crying like this post begging for help ..you play you risk ...EOS ...
I have no idea what is going on with EOS, not in that league to play it .....but I don't have a problem personally with exposing scammers and such, a lot of us are friends with him and want to help. Just sad so many are around, like damn piranhas...anyways Hulk, Good Luck <3
cheers
Sad story. That bathroom stuff tho...lol
Hii @thehulk i saw you post and i enjoyed reading it, could you please have a look on my daily analysis for Bitcoin and give me your opinion. https://steemit.com/bitcoin/@ohamdache/mid-day-update-for-the-price-of-the-bitcoin-28-06-2017
You didn't even write the way you were scammed. So what happened exactly???
Why this is in #introduceyourself category?
This post received a 1.3% upvote from @randowhale thanks to @battleaxe! For more information, click here!
NO JOKE! nailed it
So you didn't actually do the trade via localbitcoins, right?
:(
thanks for sharing
This is Awesome!
Thats worse, oh sorry about. But good votes and People here to steem you UP
Wow man. How could this happen to The Hulk? It's not the best time to say this, but welcome to steem. We got your back friend. You've been so helpful around here anyway.
Thanks man I appreciate it.
this is bad, i did hear of few people who got money stolen on LBC but wasnt sure how exactly
why are you upvoting? The author has low reputation and almost no posts anly resteems! Have you ever traded for cash on localbitcoins, I did and it doesn't work like that!
I think he was making a deal outside of the localbitcoins platform which lLBC warns all the time you shouldn't do that.
scammer a and scammer b may be the same person. if you look at the first three messages from each scammer, the first message sent has no punctuation on A & B. the second texts have punctuation. this could be because it's the same person that has acquire a certain rhythm to their pitches. either that or they are reading from the same script which could be identified and then scanned for across other platforms.
I always thought the guy behind the phone was the same guy, who they send into to make the trade is prob their pawns
Detective @alot-of-lore!! Love your insight!
https://steemit.com/steemit/@laolballs/where-does-the-money-from-steemit-come-from
New SCAM in crypto world
I wrote an article about new scam called CryptoClone. Please take a second and read it. It is important to inform steemitians what's going on. Consider resteem it and make it viral!
https://steemit.com/scam/@cryptogirl1/warning-scam-cryptoclone-people-lost-their-money
I will check it out thanks cryptogirl
damn this sucks to hear that you lost 15k!
Even worse is that justice wasn't served and you were not vindicated.
What were their local bitcoin profiles?
They didn't use a localbitcoins profile they both contacted me via cell phone. I asked scammer b for his profile his response was" I trade mycelium proBTCminer and than said he put his account on forced holiday
Welcome ! Sorry to hear about your money loss.
Hope you enjoy this place as much as I do.
It's not difficult to get started. A little effort will truly go a long way.
Good luck !
You can follow my blog @wannerbet - I'm doing a 100K trading challenge starting very soon !
Thanks, and i will follow.
omg I heard about this, damn man! 15k? for real? I feel for you, hopefully you can make that back now over this network. We got to watch each other's back! Cheers!
#follow4follow
Hopefully, that would be nice and yeah for real. 15k in cash gone, guy ran so fast through a back alley i tried to chase but he was GONE didn't even see him by the time i got out the back door.
Goddamn, as for now stick to this community man. Best advice I think I'd ever be able to give you. Better days are to come.
Good luck recovering from the losses, i'm sure with great efforts and content here you'll be back in no time, cheers!
Thanks for the encouragement!
sorry for your lost...justice must be served...i m sure karma is on its way
upvote got you $7 bucks...best I can do right now.... The first scammer was clearly doing something sketchy.. I wonder if Pizza Chef knew about any of this.
You were robbed at gunpoint for the money afterwards? I remember a post about it, but I forget what exactly happened.
I wasn't robbed at gunpoint, the scammer went into the bathroom i was about 20 feet away, what appeared to be a normal customer looking to use the bathroom knocked on the door than knocked super hard, I think signaling i was far away enough for him to make a run.
I see... So you don't think it had to do with the pizza place? Sounds like the same way a drug deal gets set up and goes wrong... followed/resteemed, looking forward to your future posts
Followed as well and thanks for the resteem. One of the guys used to work at the pizza place and went in the back.
hey friend i m new in steemit whould you help to follow i will follow you back
Hello I have upvoted you if can upvote my articel that would be great Thanks
https://steemit.com/@newmarket65
I will follow you if can follow me
hey friend i m new in steemit whould you help to follow i will follow you back
hey friend i m new in steemit whould you help to follow i will follow you back
n upvote also
They merit to finish as Louis XVI's son... : forgot in a room, ignore of every one... ( even if his son didn't merit it.. )
I'm sorry for you, good luck. I follow.
Damn bro :/ fucking scammers...
https://soundcloud.com/kjetil-eilertsen/online-cryptocoin-scammers-i-hate-them-i-hate-them-i-hate-them
Sad hear this
You made a deal outside of localbitcoins correct? I read that you shoukd wait for 2 confirmations this is not practice of LBC. You are putting LBC in a wrong light, they warn all over the place to not make changes to the terms of trade.
It was your greed to get some percet discount and unprofessionality which has nothing to do with localbitcoins.
Yes, it was not localbitcoins fault, I don't wan't to put them in a bad light if anything I want to make sure the community goes through their system and avoids people who just text you based off your ads.
Good, thank you. How you could do what you did is not understandable to me.
If anything I 100% know it was not Localbitcoins fault, and i encourage everyone to GO through the localbitcoins system, I got into cryptos in April I was new and i got a text off of my ad which is how it started. I did get scammed and no i am not trying to scam the steem community any any way, there are alot of new people and I don't want someone to make the same mistake I did. I was in the teamspeak community and tons of people knew when i got ripped off and knew i had to wait to post since they contacted me again. My mistakes is my mistakes and should not devalue localbitcoins at at all. They were using localbitcoins as a medium to contact people.
Where is the timestamp on the photo of the alleged thief? This could be any photo. If you want you can post copy of the police report, in the meantime I am informing as many upvoters as possible to reconsider their votes
The photo of the suspect with timestamp from my phone from the pizza shops security system is here http://imgur.com/a/m52yx the police have the actual video i am not in possession of the video. If you want to talk about this i can assure you I am not a scammer, if you would like a to contact me let me know.
I mean the timestamp on the video. It is not possible to detect if you say the truth or not. Other people didn't take off their votes, happy blogging
wow sorry to hear that up voted
Such a huge amount is lost. So painful. Its nice you share your story. We learn from it.
Great work! Love it when a plan comes together!
Yeah. I feel bad man...But the first time I got duped out of bitcoin...I knew that I had made a terrible mistake of not verifying the reputation of the folks offering their scam deal to me.
Thank for the warning, we got our value post. we have to be careful in the path :d
Sorry about what happened to you
I use Localbitcoins
You have to use their site for people you never traded before
For me , i usually trade small first for people I don't know then trade greater amounts when you start trusting them
I sincerely hope your not from RHODY giving us a bad name, driving all the way to QUEENS for BTC??? Could have just met me in CF and bought coins without the risk of being robbed!!!!
I am from Rhode Island and proud of it. I wasn't robbed in RI and have done a few transactions in RI that went perfectly fine.
When it sounds to good to be true, it usually is.
DeeeeeZZZaaaaaammmmmm! I'm sorry you lost your $$$. That being said, WOW... WOW. You got conned for real!
In a face to face situation, I think it would be best to stay in a public place at all times. Also, take a picture of the dude selling it to you next time.
That sucks for real man.
This is disappointing. Never can trust anyone. Always good to get someone else to look over the deal and advice.
Another option is to go into the deal without the money. Then do a second meeting.