Bitcoin.org appears to have fallen victim to a giveaway scam.
- Visitors to the site are greeted with a pop-up message inviting them to send money to a bitcoin wallet. The funds will be doubled and sent back. The message claims it is because the Bitcoin Foundation is “giving back to the community.”
- The message says only the first 10,000 users can take advantage of the offer. The message includes a QR code for the wallet as well as its address. All other site functionality is currently limited as users are not able to skirt or ignore the message
- These messages are associated with giveaway scams; these schemes give false promises of doubling one’s funds after sending an initial amount to a wallet address via QR code. Victims, in fact, receive nothing in return and lose the crypto they sent.
- CoinDesk has confirmed the messaging.
- Bitcoin.org is an open-source project that aims to support Bitcoin development.
- While it isn’t affiliated with the Bitcoin Foundation, it is often the first result on search engines when looking for “bitcoin.”
- The giveaway scam’s address has received over $17,700 in small transactions as of the time of writing, according to bitcoin explorer blockchain.com.
- In June, U.K. courts ordered the site to stop hosting the Bitcoin whitepaper over copyright infringement.
- Just days later, the site was hit with a massive denial of service attack.
Read more: Bitcoin.org Hit With DDoS Attack, Bitcoin Demanded as Ransom
