Like i stated on the bottom of the list... one should be careful and check out if one will trust a developer to send him chips to. Though there are developers that dont take chips but send a diy-kit out. So the chips arent in danger anyway.
If sending out chips do everything to prove the developer is real and find out who he is, if he can do what he claims and so on. For example... a member in my asic-chip-groupbuy will visit burnin in some days to check out his place and getting a feeling about him.