I have read lot of stories about recent ways hackers are wilding themselves to steal people's funds.
I will have to list few preventive measures to avoid being scammed maybe you could help add yours here to enable newbies learned and hold their bitcoin tight.
1. Do not engage in deep conversation with stranger who is only interested asking you about your total bitcoin holding or even regularly asking you about the platform you invested.
2. Do not be fooled with their sweet words where they keeps asking you to invest and make money your interest within 24hrs to gain about 100 percent of your investment. Note; this is purely scam otherwise no other investment platform or anyone to be trading and giving you back 100 percent of your capitals.
3. Sets your telegram account where someone from same group can't contact you because telegram is the head of scammers, they can clone or impersonate someone you know and scam you without the knowledge of the real person.
4. Do not be carried away with signup and referral bonuses, there are some people who are always thrilled with that in fact they hunt for that and sometimes they go meet the wrong site where they site would asked them to deposit some specific amount. Please newbie be warned do not be desperate to own some units of useless tokens whereby risking yourself.
5. Do not connect your wallet directly to any site you are not sure of otherwise you could be piped. The best advise is to always make a new wallet and send few gas fee to that wallet and keep your real wallet secure and safe from alteration.
6. Do not create account in any website with the same password you used in another website that is so important to you, lets for example bitcointalk and other forum do not use same password you never can tell what would happened since you don't control the platform by yourself. It's important to always use separate passwords.
7. Do not tell anyone how much is your investment or what year have you started holding bitcoin, such types of discussion often exposes' you to hackers, they don't mind using any forms of techniques to scam you since they have gain little information about you through discussion that is why it's advisable to avoid some sensitive discussions about oneself. Keep in mind that you don't have to involve yourself with any discussion about when you join bitcointalk or when and how long have you hold bitcoin probably what year. What I noticed is that most people often use this answers as secrete question / answer whereby you won't know when you are giving them this vital information from then your account could be hacked.
8. Do not memorized your seed phrase or private key or even store it where someone that knowns about what you are doing. Possibly avoid someone peeping through your phone and device while at home or office, there could be some spy camera watching over you.
Please anyone else can add theirs lets' keep the newbies awake since is already bull time scammers are looking for a way to accumulate bitcoin they didn't sort for.
Nice write-up, however let me summarise it this way:
1. Don't be greedy: It is only greed that will make someone want to invest in a project that promises out-of-the-world returns. Most people who were scammed were attracted by the huge profit these platforms offer. Anyone who can control his quest for quick profit will likely not be the victim of these scammers.
2. Be private: Some people talk too much. You will hear people talking about their investment in Bitcoin in public. Some of them go as far as showing their addresses on social media just to show how big or rich they have become through Bitcoin. So many people have not just suffered online attacks but physical ones because they expose themselves. There are cases where some crypto holders were attacked in their homes by armed robbers.
3. Keep learning: Scammers and hackers are devising new ways of carrying out their nefarious activities, this is why it is important to keep learning about how to keep your wallets safe from these criminals.
4. Be careful with Social media: Social media is a free playing ground for scammers this i why it is important not to give out any personal information to any stranger. We should always be aware that nobody can be trusted on these platforms.