A Cardano ambassador has issued a critical warning to ADA investors regarding an alarming increase in scams targeting the Cardano community. This cautionary message comes as anticipation builds up for the upcoming Chang hard fork approaches.
Cardano Ambassador Raises Scam Awareness
In a recent X (formerly Twitter) post on July 13, Pete, a Cardano community member and ambassador, alerted investors about a scam involving fake ADA giveaways. According to Pete, the forthcoming Chang upgrade has captured the attention of scammers who aim to use the hype surrounding the hard fork to deceive and exploit investors.
The malicious scheme involves scammers impersonating Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson in a deceptive YouTube video. This fraudulent video featured realistic live stream recordings that falsely depict Hoskinson announcing an ADA token giveaway, promising to double the tokens of participating investors.
In a screenshot shared by Pete, the scammers were shown running and promoting a bogus 100,000,000 ADA event, urging investors to send between 2,500 ADA and 500,000 ADA to a designated address. They deceitfully promised that participants would receive twice the amount of ADA tokens they sent.
Unfortunately, one investor fell prey to the scam and shared the incident with Pete. Believing it to be a genuine event endorsed by the Cardano Foundation, the investor sent 5,000 ADA tokens to the scam address but never received the promised giveaway.
Given the potential harm these scams could cause to other community members, the ambassador has strongly urged investors to avoid falling for these fraudulent schemes. He emphasized that the Cardano team has not issued any ADA giveaways and that any video claiming such is a scam.
Because the scams were uploaded via YouTube, many Cardano community members have stated that the popular online video-sharing platform should be held accountable. Pete has also revealed in another post that the YouTube scam that was online has been officially removed.
Furthermore, he encouraged community members to actively report these scam attempts, emphasizing their role in safeguarding new Cardano users and investors. Pete has also warned investors to remain vigilant against these scam activities to avoid potential financial loss.
ADA Defense Mechanism Against Scams
In another X post, Pete revealed that the upcoming Chang hard fork and the bullish market sentiment have increased the number of scams targeting the crypto community. The ambassador disclosed that Cardano had employed a few protection mechanisms in the community to safeguard investors from scams.
He mentioned the Cardano Shield, which has been integrated into the Gero Wallet and the Begin Wallet. The shield is an advanced security solution that provides investors premium protection from phishing threats, scams and risks associated with Cardano-based interactions.
Pete also noted that SlowingPains, a Web3 insurance ecosystem on the blockchain, is working on a cybersecurity insurance product that helps ease the financial pains of scams and crypto rug pulls. While highlighting all these innovative defense strategies and mechanisms to protect Cardano investors, Pete also revealed that investors best defense against scams was education and awareness.