Category: Cyber Currency

Is Ledger Wallet Safe

This is about the storage of cyber currency – these things only exist in the digital world so how do you store them?

Normally that is through an online ‘wallet’ where you store the access keys to your currency and those are the only evidence you have of ownership. If the keys are stolen then your cyber currency is also gone.

Most people store the keys on their computer, but some prefer something more secure and choose a hardware wallet e.g. a USB drive with specialised software.

Ledger Nano S claims to be The world’s most popular hardware wallet for cryptocurrency.

Data Breach

Ledger suffered a data breach in 2020 and confidential information on 272,00 customers was released by the hackers.

The hackers included the customers home addresses which puts them at risk of physical attack as some had substantial holdings in cyber currency on their ledger devices.

Phishing Attempts

Ledger users are frequently the targets of phishing attempts. Many scammers go to great lengths to  duplicate the ledger website and Ledger email messages. They try to get the users 24 word recovery phrase which would let them take over the account and hence steal the crypto currency.

Fake Wallets

Following the data breach in 2020, some scammers have created fake Ledger Nano wallets and are sending them out to the list of customers they have from the breach.

These fake wallets look similar to the real ones and have tricked people into ‘upgrading’ free of charge to the latest version. Sadly, these fake wallets steal the private keys needed to take the cyber currency.

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The Chinacoin Scam

YuanPay Group has put a lot of money and effort into advertising itself as the creator of China’s first cybercurrency and the only one to be backed by the Chinese government. The adverts are all over social media.

It is true that China has been considering its own cyber currency for years and may well invent it’s own such currency.

Cyber currencies from elsewhere are all banned in China as the Chinese government does not want a currency in use over which it has no control and cannot identify who has the currency.

If and when they do create a Chinese cyber currency it will under government control and far from anonymous as most other cyber currencies are.

The advertising by YuanPay claims that anyone investing in Chinacoin now will receive a return of many thousands of times their investment within a few months.

Not going to happen!

If you want to invest in any cyber currency – do take professional advice and only spend what you can afford to lose, as they are notoriously volatile.

If you have any experiences with these cybercurrency scams do let me know, by email.

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Stupidest Spam of the Week Automated Crypto Trading

Scammers love to offer money for nothing and you can be assured it always translates into money for them and losses for you.

The title of this latest such scam email is “Insanely Easy Way to Become Rich in 2020”.

I think this scammer is just reusing old scam messages without noticing how out of date it is.

“What if I told you that you can become a millionaire this year?”.

Then it goes on about how people make huge sums investing in crypto currencies such as Bitcoin and claims  he has perfected a way to make the gains with no risk of losing anything.

He has an automated system that will invest your money and is guaranteed to make you lots more.

He claims that members typically make a minimum profit of £1,296 per day.

Logically that makes no sense as an average is simply calculated and cannot be ‘typically’.

Then he claims that users of his system work for an average of 20 minutes per day or less.

Again, logically impossible  as an average cannot be less than itself.

It’s all rubbish. Of course. There is no automated system and no way of guaranteeing that investments of any kind always win.

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Cyber Currencies in 2021

In 2017, Bitcoin reached a price of $19,783 each but also dropped to $4,400 at one point.

Bitcoin and all of the other cyber currencies have no assets, nothing to guarantee a minimum value, so the prices can vary wildly and be highly unpredictable.

Ethereum fell in 2018 from a high of $1,300 to just over $90 by December, although it did rally after that.

Some people believe that Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies should be considered to be a new asset class rather than a high risk novelty item and hope that governments and institutions will start to treat cyber currencies as assets suitable for widespread investment. Maybe this will happen in 2021 and accelerate the move to cyber currencies. However, there is nothing certain in this and cyber currencies may well have another bumpy unpredictable year.

The development of stablecoins may be a big step forward in wider acknowledgement of these currencies.

Stablecoins

Stablecoins are cryptocurrencies designed to minimize the volatility of the price of the stablecoin, by pegging it to some “stable” asset or basket of assets. A stablecoin can be pegged to a cryptocurrency, fiat money, or to exchange-traded commodities.

New stablecoins are being created to try to bring stability to the cyber currency market, but it’s not an easy step.

Some Popular Cybercurrencies

1. Bitcoin

Bitcoin is the biggest and most famous of the cyber currencies and it has made a lot of people millionaires. However, it has also lost huge sums for people.

Some experts think Bitcoin could be one of the best cryptocurrencies to invest in through 2021

2. Ethereum

Ethereum is a major player and billions of dollars worth of Ethereum were traded in 2020.

A major upgrade called Ethereum 2 (or Serenity) is in progress, due for launch in early 2021.

This will make Ethereum more efficient and able to process more transactions more quickly.

3. Litecoin

Litecoin has a market capitalisation in the billions of dollars and is growing strongly.

It is connected to Bitcoin and that should help it’s future.

4. Bitcoin Cash

First launched in 2017, Bitcoin Cash was launched as a scalable branch of the original Bitcoin, after traders raised concerns over Bitcoin’s scalability.

It’s still going strong.

5. Ripple

Ripple is interesting but more complex to understand as the name covers both the Ripple platform (RippleNet) and its virtual currency (Ripple XRP). XRP is currently the world’s fourth biggest cryptocurrency by market capitalisation.

Overall, cyber currencies are getting stronger each year and the likelihood of them becoming commonly used as an asset is increasing.

However, any investors need to be very wary of the volatile nature of these currencies.

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Bitcoin Update

Bitcoin has been as high as $19,000 in 2020 but also as low as $6,500 – it can be extremely volatile as there are no real world assets to give it a solid value.

For those who invest in Bitcoin, it’s an unpredictable roller coaster with wild swings up and down. This can make people very rich or they can lose almost everything. Not for the faint hearted and not for anyone who cannot afford to take a big loss.

There are endless Bitcoin investment plans offered by a myriad of organisations.

Some are genuine but generally they don’t care if you win or lose on Bitcoin – they always win whether the price goes up or down.

The volatility of the currency and the occasional stories of people making fortines with Bitcoin encourage scammers to create their scam offerings where you always lose and they always win, unless they get caught by the authorities.

 Bitcoin Scams

Cryptocurrency scams are now a popular way for scammers to trick people into sending money. And they pop up in many ways. Most crypto scams can appear as emails trying to blackmail someone, online chain referral schemes, or bogus investment and business opportunities.

If you’re trying to pay for something online and the retailer wants you to pay in Bitcoin, maybe they are just offering options, nut generally this means there is a scam in progress and you will be the victim if you send that money as it will not be recoverable.

Latest Bitcoin Scam

Periodically, highly organised scammers produce floods of emails, adverts, fake newspaper articles and more in a coordinated attempt to lure people into their scam offering of Bitcoins.

Often these use fake celebrity endorsements such as claiming Richard Branson is selling everything to invest in Bitcoin. Recent names used include Alan Sugar and Daniel Radcliffe. The celebrities have nothing to do with this and try to stop their names being used to con people, but the scammers typically shut up shop and move on before being caught.

Headlines such as

“SPECIAL REPORT: Daniel Radcliffe’s Latest Investment Has The Government And Big Banks Terrified.”

“United Kingdom citizens are already raking in millions of Pounds from home using this “wealth loophole” – but is it legitimate?”

These such messages are always part of a coordinated scam.

If you do consider investing in Bitcoin or other cyber currencies, never respond to such emails, adverts or newspaper articles – do your own research on how to invest and take professional advice if possible.

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OneCoin Cryptocurrency Scammer in Court

Mark Scott, a US lawyer accused of laundering proceeds from the OneCoin cryptocurrency – alleged to be a Ponzi scheme scam – went on trial in New York. He was accused of laundering approximately $400 million through hedge funds and transferring that back to his colleagues.

OneCoin claims to be a digital currency similar to Bitcoin and the founders are thought to have raised an estimated $4bn worldwide, including millions from the UK, since it began in 2015.

It was founded in Bulgaria by Dr Ruja Ignatova, who disappeared in 2017 and her brother Konstantin Ignatov, who ran the company in her absence and has since been arrested in the US.

The Sales Pitch

Dr Ruja, told her audience that the future belonged to cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, which had made millions for many investors and were free of the high cost of traditional banking.

She offered an alternative – a perfectly safe cryptocurrency of her own devising called OneCoin. She exhorted people to join this financial revolution that would become bigger than Bitcoin within a few years

It is estimated that up to 70,000 people in the UK may have invested with OneCoin and hence lost everything.

It appears to have been a fraud from the beginning as investors trying to retrieve their money found out, when they couldn’t get anything back.

The banks realised it was a scam and stopped doing business with OneCoin. So Ruja moved to using money laundering with people such as Mark Scott.

The officials are keenly trying to find Ruja to put her on trial as well.

If you have any experiences with Onecoin, do let me know, by email.

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