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had the same scam experience about 2 years ago...
Would you say it's the same actor / shared playbook?
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
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.
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.
Is there a non-negligible cost to rolling your esim?
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.
No you got it right.
So what I do for data, besides switching devices, is instead of topping up, I just get a new esim every time. One less correlation. Just in case. I don't trust silent.link or lnvpn, but then I'm probably a toxic conspiracy theorist lmao
I dont need a sim for usage, just for a number.
PS: Can you share us some intel for silent.link? See #1091068
used silent.link for my trip to Japan. slightly expensive, but super effective.
haven't ever tried in the US
I've used both lnvpn and a couple of bitrefill white label esims in the US (despite my t-mo physical sim being US - I figured using that in the US is asking for trouble) and it worked fine. lnvpn has been much cheaper for me than what bitrefill offers.
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.
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.
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.
This reminds me of this Hacked podcast episode, talking about this scenario
https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/hacked-29408/episodes/the-sim-farm-269335802
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.
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.
I asked this question here on SN and seems that few people know the answer about who is "darthcoin" #1251738
I already suggested the 4 words to use when someone asks you for 10M sats the other day, lol.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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 😀
"I'd like to borrow 100 sats for 24 hours, just to get my miner in Philadelphia set up..."
yeah that crack me up... wtf, you still don't see the scam?
buahahahaha
Always play the "poor guy" card...
@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.
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?
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.
Exactly.
This can happen literally anywhere you interact with people, even SN or Nostr.
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.
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.