Hi guys, I want to share with you my simple methodology (beta) of spotting ICO scams.
The methodology
There are criteria with various risk points. Summarize all the points of the criteria that the ICO meets to get total score. Total score represents a risk grade on which you can lean to take a risk or not.
Scam points and criteria:
1 point: minor suspicions (for each)
3 points: anon devs; no code snippets, videos, or beta; rushing
5 points: unrealistic goals; fuzzy whitepaper; self-mod topic
10 points: bought account; no escrow
Risk and total score:
low (0-5)
medium (6-10)
high (11-15)
very high (16-20)
extremely high (21 and more)
Example
Let's imagine there's an ongoing ICO of Supercoinxxx in which you want to invest some money.
The topic is self-mod (5 points) with devs that have unrealistic goals (5 points) like creating a decentralized stock market in 2-3 month and a fuzzy whitepaper (5 points) with no technical details. Also you found two minor suspicions (2 points) based on your experience. Which gives 17 points in total. Based on that score you conclude that risk is very high and skipping this ICO.
Updated: added "no escrow" criteria.
in my own opinion i cannot determine if that ICO is scam because i thinks all coming from this forum sites is filtered there application before they introduce to the market, for bounty campaign participation or investment.we only know if the campaign is scam or fraud if they not give a payment to all the participant or the investor in the end of campaign.the only things should i know by put the name of that ICO in the google and put a word scam and search if that campaign is legit or fraud.