Scam trends:
- There is an ongoing scam issue where "lenders" are saying they'll issue loans for collateral. The "lender" then takes the collateral and disappears. Prevent this by using reputable escrow providers or only dealing with lenders you trust. Keeping in mind that proving available funds isn't necessarily connected to whether or not a lender will steal collateral and disappear, you can also ask a lender asking for collateral to show he has the funds to lend you by signing a message with his private key (most BTC clients have a GUI allowing you verify messages, though they don't all use the same scheme to do this -- if a message fails to verify, you may wish to ask the signer to tell you which client and scheme he used so you can double-check using the same set-up he has ).
I enjoy this part, it shows that borrowers can face scammers too, not only the lenders. But I don't understand the part "you can also ask a lender asking for collateral to show he has the funds to lend you by signing a message with his private key (most BTC clients have a GUI allowing you verify messages, though they don't all use the same scheme to do this...). Can someone explain it to me, please?