We Investigated Welonax: Legit or Scam? The Facts

Recently, Welonax.com service appeared, promoting itself as a platform to keep cryptocurrency and other assets securely. I managed to gather credible proof that clearly confirms it is, in fact, a fraudulent service.

Regardless of the promises of the most convenient, reliable, and customer-centric service, Welonax.com does not fulfill any of them. In fact, all this is just a shiny wrap around a blatant scam, which takes your money and never gives them back. Any tales about gifts, backing from celebrities etc are non-existent as well.

It is better to prevent, than repair and repent!

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Welonax Scam Overview

Originally, Welonax poses as a crypto trading & cryptowallet service with exceptionally low commission fees. Another notable selling point for this site is partnerships with celebrities that are known in the crypto world. Vitalii Buterin (Ethereum creator), Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Warren Buffet – the site says about being supported by them. To make these claims look more realistic, frauds employ deepfake videos with those celebs promote the fraud as the best thing in the world. For obvious reasons, Elon Musk is the most common choise for that. But, as I mentioned above, all this is just a glaring wrap around an obvious scam.

Welonax Scam

First and foremost, Welonax repeats the design of many equivalent websites. There are quite a few examples, like Velonax, Zagrebex or Aerorium. They are completely undistinguishable in terms of visual elements, with slight discrepancies in the site header. Other particulars, and at times even crypto wallet addresses, are the same. Presumably, all these deceptive sites are managed by the same team of fraudsters.

Cryptocurrency Scam Summary

How the Welonax Scam Works?

Welonax is a part of a extensive cryptocurrency scam scheme that started circulating actively in 2023. Swindlers who stand behind it use numerous website designs, which still share the same overall layout. Another mutual element are the ways the scams like NAME are promoted, and the manner all this ends up to the victim of the scam. To reach peak efficiency, frauds apply sophisticated psychological tricks that make the user believe in the validity of the website. But let’s review them one by one.

Step 1: Promotion

To start the deceptive scheme, criminals set up and fill accounts on popular social media platforms. They primarily aim at Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. Subsequently, the advertising campaign commences. Utilizing bots and sponsored promotions (when achievable), scam actors intensify the exposure of their fraudulent activities to potential victims. And as I said, crooks do not shy away using deepfake for creating videos with the aforementioned celebs that promote their scam to the public. To boost the folks even more, swindlers claim the bonus for every user who registers the service immediately.

Promotions of cryptoscams like Welonax in TikTok. Most of these videos are AI-generated deepfakes

Users obtain an encouragement to enroll, enticed by the commitment of getting cryptocurrency prizes valued at hundreds of dollars, all for free. To increase the appeal of the offer, false claims of cooperation with a celebrity are added. As you may guess, these claims are completely baseless.

Step 2: Gaining Traffic

Upon clicking the promotions, victims end up on a page filled with appealing offers. “Crypto starts with Welonax”, “Your crypto savings are secured with Welonax, “Start earning with Welonax – they look rather authoritative. To heat up users and make them proceed to step 3, fraudsters say that obtaining the promised bonus requires registration. And since nothing questionable happens at this point, unaware users happily keep on – especially as the gift appears to be right behind the corner.

At this point, it is possible to skip the scam without any losses. Before you sign up using your personal info, rascals will not be able to earn even a penny from your presence on the website.

Step 3: Data Gathering

This is where the main fraud action begins. As I just said, scammers bait folks into registration for bonuses. And all the personal information needed for it – username, email, cryptocurrency wallet address – are valuable for user identification. Only by gathering this information and selling it further into the Darknet, swindlers can earn quite a penny. Nonetheless, their plans go much further.

As it turns out, you cannot use the alleged bonus right away. To make it at least usable for crypto purchases, the user should top up the account with the sum of a bonus. At this point, the final stage of the scam begins.

Step 4: Requesting funds

Eventually, any crypto operations require you to have funds on your account. In the case of Welonax, users are also forced to top up to get the bonuses. And this is what creates most of the money flow to this fraudulent website. By topping up the account, users hope to get the committed gift (usually $500-1000 in USDT), and may start participating on this website hoping to use all the transferred funds and withdraw them.

This, however, is where the first obvious problems start to surface. When comparing the real crypto wallet vs what the site says, you can spot that no transactions are done whatsoever. And then, when you’d try to withdraw the capital from your account, the scam is finally uncovered to the user.

Step 5: Escaping from Funds Withdrawal

There’s no need to explain that scoundrels have zero intentions to give your money back. But to make the denial look more legitimate, they’ve crafted a whole pack of reasons to decline the wireout request. Most of them repeat what Know Your Client guidelines say, but in this case they are here exclusively to make the withdrawal impossible.

By asking for your personal information, deceivers just stall hoping for you to accept the loss and stop contacting them. If you don’t – well, there are a dozen other checks you would desperately need to undergo before getting your funds back. And each of these checks will reveal more and more information, which – you guessed it right – will be then sold on the Darknet. Never reveal your real info to strangers!

Signs of Scam

I gathered several facts that point at the scammy nature of the Welonax.com. Actually, there are a lot of scams that fall under the same points, so they are pretty much universal.

• Absent company details. Welonax does not provide any documentation about its ownership, location or registration. No legitimate contact details are given either. Moreover, it appears that the domain and all social network pages were registered quite recently.
• Fake sponsorship from a celebrity. Scams like Welonax like to pick a celebrity as a sponsor of this entire campaign. For obvious reasons, fraudsters generally choose Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mr. Beast, Mark Zuckerberg, and similar celebrities. They do not disdain claiming partnership with a company as well. Even though Coinbase, Binance or MetaMask never heard of Welonax, they do not care – this creates a halo of credibility.
• Potential Ponzi Scheme. The scam relies on a Ponzi-like referral system to spread reach through social media. In fact, only the first members will receive the payoff, at the cost of the money brought by other members.
• Hype without facts. Frauds can cheer up their victims from time to time, using claims about non-existent events. “We got contracts with Coinbase”, “Elon Musk mentioned us as the most prolific crypto project” – you could likely hear something like that. This is made to make people believe in their money return. This can be the sauce to make people top-up their accounts once again.
• Crypto-only incoming payments. Whether the user tries to top-up the account, hackers will only accept payments in crypto – no bank transfers or other payment methods. Such an approach completely hides the identity of the company and deprives you of the ability to ask for a refund.
• Claims are too good to be true. Let’s be sane and sober: even in crypto space, there are not many places where you can earn 50-100-200%. Being able to participate in all of them is nearly impossible, as well as it is impossible to insure or hedge all the risks. Even by that reason alone I can tell that the Welonax is a definite scam.

What Should I do as a Victim?

If you had to deal with Welonax site and fell victim to that scam, there are still some steps to take. They will make further scam attempts harder, and also boost the knowledge about that scam among folks.

• Report the scam to authorities. Search for local authorities responsible for financial frauds, and also notify wallet providers and social networks via their tech support. It is essential to make the further operations of these scammers much harder.
• Tell your close friends. That step is similar to reporting to the authorities, and has similar effects. By posting info about scam crypto service, you decrease the pool of people they can fool.
• Get evidence. Screenshot or save all the information related to the website. URL, screenshot of a main page, login window, EULA, account top-up menu, wallet addresses – all these things may be useful for authorities to find the scammers.
• Check whether you can ask for a refund. As I’ve said above, crypto payments do not fall under refund policies in most banks. Nonetheless, in some circumstances, it is still possible. Never lose hope until you actually confirm it is gone.
• Make your mistake your lesson. Financial losses are always a reason for frustration, but let’s imagine it was a pay for scam revealing courses. Remember the key features of these crypto scam sites, the way they attract people and what they promise. In the future, you will easily recognize a trap of spending no money.

Scan your system for possible malware infections

Beware of cross scams! Scam actors can use your trust to make you download some stuff or interact with certain documents. It may be a trap that installs malware to your system. There are no moral barriers or limits for these scoundrels.

Throughout the course of the scam, fraudsters may get in touch with you with particular files. Alternatively, they may offer you to deploy “cryptocurrency wallet applications” or “browser extensions” to simplify access to your crypto savings. As we already figured out, these scammers have no intent of giving back your capital. So, what do these messages and browser plugins represent? Correct – this is another element of the deceptive plan designed to entice you into willingly installing harmful applications onto your computer.

Both plugins and files included to emails can function as a shell for various malware. In this situation, I foresee the presence of spyware and stealers among all forms of threats. While it is not mandatory for scammers to distribute malware, the likelihood is always greater than zero. As previously mentioned, their ethics is of little concern, and their dignity is already seriously marred. They have no scruples to give up and strive to boost revenues.

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