I've recently become interested in Dextools and the absurd number of shitcoins that are generated there every second.

Although I haven't invested any money in it, it's important to know how scams work in order to be aware and avoid becoming a victim of one.

Here is a list of the top cryptocurrency frauds methods:


1. MEV Bot Sandwich Exploits: Fraudsters find blockchain transactions that have enough slippage tolerance to allow them to front-run the deal and profit from it.

2. Honey Pot Frauds: Fraudsters produce new coins, add liquidity on decentralized exchanges, impose selling restrictions, and then eliminate liquidity once they have attracted enough purchasers.

3. The project is turned into a honeypot by scammers who first permit selling before blocking it after luring buyers. Later, they take away liquidity

4. Manipulating Sell Tax: To discourage selling, scammers change the token's sell tax to 99%. This is frequently evident through "Set Fee" calls on Etherscan.

5. Modifying Marketing cost: Scammers set a 99% marketing cost to prevent selling; these calls on Etherscan are often identified as "Set Structure" calls.

6. Delayed Honey Pot By Blacklist: Scammers use wallet blacklisting to enforce a delayed honey pot and prevent selling; these calls are frequently identified as "Blacklist" calls on Etherscan.

7. A Hidden Honey Pot Through a High Gas Fee: Scammers create tokens with excessively high gas fees to deter consumers from selling.

8. Hidden Honey Pot By Internal Function: Scammers use internal routines that are hardcoded and hidden from view on Etherscan to build delayed honey pots.

9. Scams to Remove Liquidity: Scammers couple a valuable token with a worthless one, create liquidity, deceive users into exchanging the precious token for the worthless one, and then remove liquidity.

10. Liquidity Drainer Schemes: Fraudsters mint new tokens, lock or burn existing liquidity, and then drain the pool by selling newly created tokens into it.

11. Hidden Mint Function Scams: Scammers mint tokens using a hidden mint function, which is similar to liquidity drainers.

12. Token Drainer Scams: Scammers utilize secret routines to drain tokens from users' wallets and reset their balances to zero after locking or burning liquidity.

13. Slow Rug Scams: Con artists issue a token, reserve a supply for themselves, and then sell off this reserve over time, lowering the value of the chart.

14. Slow Rug Distribution Scams: Scammers send tokens to numerous wallets under their control and sell them gradually, causing their value to gradually decline.

15. Influencer-Driven Slow Rugs: After a single tweet, influencers who receive tokens from developers progressively sell them, creating a slow rug.

16. Twitter Pump and Dump Schemes: A gang of influencers works together in secret discussions to inflate a coin artificially before dumping it on Twitter.

17. Insider Pump & Dump Scams: To capitalize on the enthusiasm, developers and their associates buy a sizeable portion of their coin upon launch, occasionally sniping coins.

18. Pre-Sale Fraud: Scammers plan pre-sale deals on websites like Pinksale, steal the money, then issue the tokens with little liquidity.

19. Pre-Sale Dump Scams: Scammers plan pre-sale offerings on websites like Pinksale, enticing their friends and followers to take part before dumping tokens in large quantities once the pre-sale begins.

20. Twitter Pre-Sale Offering Frauds: Scammers frequently engage in fraudulent operations when they provide wallet addresses on Twitter in place of official pre-sale venues.

21. Psy Ops & Reverse Psychology: Token creators use reverse psychology to either prohibit outsiders from entering or deter malevolent actors from purchasing.

22. Burned or locked liquidity with 0% tax PsyOp: By offering 0% tax at launch and saying that liquidity has been burned or frozen, developers lure people into a scam currency. This is a popular psychological ploy.

 23. Renounced Contract PsyOp: By abandoning the token contract but keeping a secret backdoor for prospective frauds, developers trick consumers into investing in a fraudulent coin.

24. Sniper Prevention PsyOp: Teams falsely state that a 99% sell tax is in place to discourage snipers but never reduce it, misleading users in the process.

These are the handful I've looked at, but normally I steer clear of shitcoin regardless of the buzz because they are largely scams, and I advise others to do the same because you can never truly tell if a project is a fraud because most scammers are quite skilled at what they do.
Before investing, look for recommendations because I believe that certain influential people in the sector do so for worthwhile projects.