I got scammed and invested crypto (USDT and BTC) in a website called dficoin.co. Once I sent the crypto to the internal wallet I tried to transfer it back but I couldn't. After some days, now the website is down and I don't know if I am able to retrieve the crypto from the wallet. I have the addresses (erc20 and bitcoin) and the hashes. Do you know how could I try?
2 Answers
I am sorry for your loss. There are a few things you can do. None of them will necessarily get you your money back, but there is a chance. Also, you should keep in mind the cost vs. how much you have to gain. There are professionals that can help trace the crypto you sent to a known exchange. Once they do that you can often get a court order for the exchange to reveal the owner of the account. The owner of the account may be the actual one who stole from you, or he may know them. What you will need is
- A crypto forensic analyst (disclaimer: I am one) to track your crypto and verify that there is some person using an exchange etc. that can be discovered and approached. Keep in mind that the analyst may find that your crypto was moved through a mixer or some other entity that will make tracing impossible.
- If the analyst finds an exchange account or some similar info you will need a lawyer to takes the analyst's findings and get a court order from a judge to reveal the identity of the exchange account owner.
- Once you find your guy the story is still not over. You must get him to give back the crypto. This can be easy (usually it isn't) if the thief sent your crypto directly to an exchange that is willing to listen to the court. The exchange will freeze his account until everything is settled.
- Usually it is not so simple. The thief probably did not send it directly to the exchange, he might have used someone else who had an account, or at least claims that he is not the thief. In that case...
- You will need to either prove that the owner of the exchange account is indeed the thief or get the guy to tell you who he got your crypto from. (again not usually so easy!)
- Sometimes things are smoother than you'd expect. Sometimes the owner of the exchange account cannot afford to fight in court so he will just pay you. This is very sad :( beware other innocent people can get hurt in this process.
As far as i know none of the transactions are reversible once sent. Sorry to hear that, but you need to be more careful on the market many scam are going on. My advice for you is if you ever need an app to trade or exchange cryptos, the best apps would be Bybit and Binance.
