For days, I have been working hard to protect Steemit users from scammers!
I guess many of you have already received one of my warnings about scams, phishing and virus threat spreading on Steemit.
It looks like my work is paying because as of today, they decided to start a disinformation campaign about me by spreading FUD with post published from accounts they hacked.
Look:
All this authors are well know hacked account that have sent hundreds of phishing attempts last days.
This is good news!
As from now, I have revealed no less than 30 scam/phishing attempts. You can find a full list in my last scam reporting post.
To me, this FUD campaign is good news. This means that hackers feel threatened by my preventive actions and are forced to counter-attack to spread doubt among Steemit users.
An exhausting fight
Fighting those scammers led me to send nearly 20,000 warnings just over the last 30 days, preventing me to communicate as usual with my followers.
I received dozens of requests for help from users who had their account hacked. I had to explain them how to recover their account.
I also had to manage hundreds of comments from people who were worrying about the safety of their account after clicking on phishing links. Unfortunately, because of lack of time and resources, I have not been able to reply to everyone. Please apologize!
Thanks you for your support!
Finally, I have received an overwhelming support from the community for my work.
I can not say how many "thank you" comments I received. And unfortunately, for the same reasons mentioned above, I could not reply to each of them.
So, I take this opportunity to say a BIG THANK YOU TO ALL for your encouragement!
Honestly, that's what makes me want to continue this fight against malicious people.
Thanks to all of you who contacted me to report scams so I can update my warning bot.
And thank you to @steemcleaners for their cooperation with me, especially @guiltyparties with whom I have almost daily contacts to synchronize our actions. He is also a witness and deserve your vote!
Thanks for reading!
While I appreciate what you're trying to do, I find the warnings you give to be just as annoying.
I get all excited to see someone posting a comment on one of my posts, and damn it's arcange, I love that gu... oh man, what's this crap? No, I wasn't going to send some random steem because they asked me to. What did you think of my post though?
It's always hard to find the right balance between security and user's comfort.
But to me, security is priority and I aimed at preventing user's from being scammed, even if my warning could be found a bit intrusive or annoying.
Unfortunately, there is no indicator to know if the user who will receive my warning is well informed about protecting himself or not.
Sorry to disappoint you.
I don't see the benefit in attacking you - only newer users would believe those messages and those are bound to have little money. Older Steemians know your name and what you do for the community. A few hours ago I noticed a comment from an obvious scammer on a post and right underneath I saw your usual message. I was like - 'oh, good, @arcange already knows about it'. So, thank you!
Doubt is like a little seed that you sow. It can grow, even in unlikely places. Hence the reason of my post, to cut it at the root.
This is the coolest feedback. Thank you =)
You're the man (or woman) @arcange i appreciate what you do...
Thank you for the work you do @arcange. I have seen your comments on posts and have been meaning to look into you as a witness. With this post I've just gone ahead and voted for both you and @guiltyparties who I first came across this week on a post by @abh12345.
It's good to see that more community focussed witnesses, such as @steemcommunity, are getting involved lately. It would be great if a whole bunch of you got into the top fifty! 😍
hear hear! :D
@gillianpearce, thank you so much for your support and I'm sure @guiltyparties will appreciate it as I do.
Take care!
You are a good man, thank you for telling me about spam or scam, I have been choosing you as my witness..
Thank you for your support. Really appreciated!
Your hard work is really appreciated @arcange.
Feel free to send people to me if you can't find time to explain how to recover/protect their account.
I have written a couple of easy to follow, step by step guides I can refer them to.
@simplymike, you are doing an amazing job at educating users.
Thanks a lot!
Thanks a lot. I’m trying my best. :0)
Awesome!!! If you haven't got it already, I'm rushing over to the witness page to give you my vote.
Stick it to the scammers man, stick it to 'em good!!! :-D
Cg
Thanks you for your support, @cryptogee
My pleasure :-)
Cg
Dude this deserves a 10.000% upvote.!!
So many phishing comments have dropped by the last month or so, and every time it was you underneith there replying. You have made golden effort in order to save all of our sorry ignorant asses ;)
Yeah they feel you hunting, that why the bag of crap is spread out over you. In the end we all will know who is right, but I can imagine that it doesnt feel cool at all.
A big thank you..and thank you..and thank you!
Just wanted to affirm what you said about the scammers running a misinformation campaign against you. It is a good thing. A very good thing and hopefully it leads to their demise.
If the only complaint that some people have about what you're doing is that it clutters up their post, or that it is akin to spam, you can also count that as a win.
It would be great if there was some kind of banner alert or some kind of link that popped up at login so that people could see it the moment they come on. Seems like something a dev would have to implement, though.
If the only other complaint is that "only newbies would fall for that" well, that's okay, too, because there's different levels of newbies here. How can you, as you say, distinguish between who's susceptible and who's not? And i if the prevailing thought is it's the newbies who fall for it, the scammers know that, too.
Until some better alternative comes along, keep up the good work. :)
This is the real witness who protects steemit, but not like some witnesses who became upvote bots( that rob steemians), thanks for growing naturally in steemit and providing value to it.
On this, I fully agree with you. Thanks @clixmoney
Thank you for always doing good activity. I read bad rumors about you, and I get to laugh honestly. I think that is proof that you work hard.
I met you on site months ago as a brand new steemian. And have followed your site for all that time. If someone is complaining they lost 20,000+, they've been on site quite long enough to not let their 52ch-passkey be hacked¿ I would have thought. 😉
Resteemed
Thanks for all the time, energy and awesome work you do for Steemit and for protecting us @arcange. Your presence in this community is invaluable.
Thanks you @creativista. Makes me warm at heart.
That's surely a nice feeling :)
Good job its fantastic my friend @arcange Greatings
Thanks for this useful post @arcange and thank you to @eaglespirit for resteeming it (which is how I got to see it).
Yes, you must be making an impact on their activities for them to target you in this way. Here's hoping you continue the fight in keeping this platform safe for other users.
Gratefully
@arcange ... my account was hacked.. thank you for what you do for the community... I do not know if you can help or not, but once I recovered my steem account my Reputation score was at 54, but my now my Reputation is at 0 and my past post are grayed out. I am confused how the hacker removed my reputation score and now it is at 0? thanks in advance for your answer, and help.
You can contact @steemcleaners on their dedicated channel on steemt.chat
If account recovery is confirmed, they might remove their flags and restore your reputation.
Hi, I removed all the links and got my reputation restored... once again you are the bomb.. thank you so much.. I don't know how you tracked all my spam comments, there was a ton... uggghh but looks like things are back to normal.. :)
@tastetwist, glad to read you recovered your account and your reputation.
I hope you got your lesson and will be even more cautious.
Take care!
:) thank you, lesson learned :)
Thank you so much @arcange for always reminding us.really appreciated ang i will vote you sir as my witness.
if my account hacked i will die!!!!!!!!
congratulations arcange for your great efforts...as i can see from the pics all the scammers use the same language .. :) ....
...keep up and be strong,i very happy intelliguy was the link to meet you...
...you guys add value on steemit community and i'm sure your efforts are and will be rewarded eventually... bravo guys!!
First thing I noticed was the same copy paste message.
Thank YOU for all this great job !
Kudos to you for taking this responsibility on. I for one, really appreciate it. So a big Thank You to you.
we will always support you @arcange
Thank you!
My only regret is that one can only vote for you once, @arcange! Job well done!
Maybe you only have one vote, but for me yours is invaluable! Thank you for your support.
23.649$ !?
Imagine what they would have done if you had cost them 49.99$ :-D
Joking aside, great work! I try my best to report it to steemcleaners, but I can't do it on the scale you can. I've been here since January and still can't say with certainty which projects with the steem in their name are legit and which ones are the scam.
Makes me scary 😱
you are welcome.your work for steemit and newbies is really appreciated thanks for informing us about these scams
A very heartfelt thank you for putting in the work. It's clear to me you love this platform!! Thanks for doing your best to preserve its integrity.
Can these hackers really get your password by just clicking a link?
No. You need to enter it yourself.
OK, so they lure you to a site where they ask you to give them your information, so it really is the users fault, first for clicking a link they shouldn't and then for giving out their information at the site were the link takes them to.
Great job and we appreciate your efforts. It amazes me how lazy they are, they couldn't even come up with different dialogue in the different posts. We need some whales to crush their accounts.
Remember the scammers use hacked accounts and stay behind in shadow.
Crushing an account used for phishing would prevent the original owner to restore it to its previous state if he/she succeed to recover it.
What does FUD mean. So all accounts lost the same amount? I am not sure how this hacking works. Came here accidentally by someone elses post (person was warned because of?)
FUD means Fear - Uncertainty - Doubt
This is a well now manipulation technique, often used by politician.
No they didn't. It is just copy/paste of the same comment.
Good post as always!
We need to keep fighting.
Hi, I need urgent help. My posting key has been hacked and I automatic posts are being posted using my account. How to get out of this? Please help.
My account posting key was hacked. Do not click on any links. @arcange is true. There is phishing site that hacks posting key. In case your posting key gets hacked, change your password immediately and make sure that you do not click on any unknown links. Thanks to @clixmoney for the help.
@puregrace, feel free to contact me on steem.chat if you need help.
@arcange, I think I got it solved except that I need my downvotes from mack-bot and guard removed.
Write a comment to @steemcleaners or to @anyx
Ok, doing it right now!
Thank you. Youre the MVP sir @arcange
Congratulations @arcange! You have completed some achievement on Steemit and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
Click on any badge to view your own Board of Honor on SteemitBoard.
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One tried to get me too, from one of the accounts you listed above. I just put the spam and you came! Yay!! I love my Arcange. xoxo
Glad my warning was helpful. Thanks @eaglespirit
this says you might not be human! buahahah its the "Steem Plus " app
Thank you @arcange for your awesome work to protect our community! It is much appreciated and you are definitely getting my witness vote :)
Sorry, but I can't see your vote :/
lol! I started to make a post on the whole scamming issue and didn't get to it yet. Let me do it now :) Tell me once you see it! xx Lucy
Got it. Thank you for your support!
When pushed to the wall, they will turn back and bite. Do not let their noisemaking deter you. Continue your good works @arcange.
I have received your message on my comment section, when such dumb links appear. Thank you for trying to keep the community safe.
Great job !
Maybe they'll scamper off into the sewers if we sabotage their phishing attempts enough.
I am blessed that I follow you here on steemit because you trap all those who are doing things for their own benefit. A million thanks and God bless you always @arcange
So the hacker was using the accounts he stole to say that it's all your fault? I ask because I had flagged tastetwist but seems that account is back to its original owner and I can remove my flag right?
Yes. Smart, isn't it ?
Up to you. If account recovery is confirmed, then why not...
What you do here is highly commendable. Keeping this site free from scammers and abusers is a daunting task. You keep one down and 10 more springs out. It's an unending process. However, your dedication in doing so will make this place a better one. Many will rise to support you.
Thank you for your encouraging comment @leeart
Your hard work deserves more praise. It's not easy what you are doing.
I get a comment about this, but I already know about the warning comments. Thank you for the notification.
good information friend, all my support, I hope you support me.
Thanks so much for all your hard work, @simplymike and for keeping an eye out for me!