With the hype, effort, and energy that constantly swirl around cryptocurrency, it’s no wonder that a wide variety of scams have surfaced along with it.
Thanks to tactics like hoaxes, cryptojacking, and outright theft of coins, investors have more work to do than ever to ensure that they’re actually profiting from the venture.
Of course, there are less scam-oriented opportunity seekers who are just as intent on making some quick money from the cryptocurrency craze. Apart from the vendors who’ve stepped in to fill the void in the mining technology space, a number of tech companies are also selling hardware to store the user’s coins. These cryptocurrency wallets–as opposed to the digital wallets users may already deploy–function a lot like an external hard drive for cryptocurrency.
If they’re not knockoff websites that steal all of your money, that is.
Trezor, the manufacturer of a highly secure physical device that serves as the wallet, recently announced that counterfeits masquerading as their site via a phishing campaign had hit the web.
In this case, it wasn’t merely that the knock-off items were cheap replicas (like those “Nike” shoes you can find for sale in the back of a van) since it’s not physical devices that are for sale, but rather a phishing attack intentionally designed to steal the currency from unsuspecting users by convincing them to hand over their personal seed.
The fake wallet has now been taken down
…but not until after some victims had already lost their coins.
Trezor warns the public to always check for the https designation before entering any information, and to never enter your order number into a computer since their device generates that. Any level of internet user has to be on their guard against phishing scams, identity theft, and other similar crimes, but people delving into the world of cryptocurrency investing are already dealing in a space that attracts people looking for anonymous income that cannot be tracked down.