Is Xlinkopen Legit or Another Scam? The Truth Revealed

Recently, Xlinkopen.com service surfaced, promoting itself as a platform where you can securely store cryptocurrency and other assets. I managed to gather reliable supporting information that clearly confirms it is, actually, a fraudulent service.

Regardless of the promises of the most easy, dependable, and client-friendly service, Xlinkopen.com does not fulfill any of them. In fact, all this is just a gilded wrap around a blatant scam, which takes your money and data and never gives them back. Any stories about gifts, sponsorship from celebrities etc are non-existent as well.

Xlinkopen Scam Overview

Originally, Xlinkopen poses as a cryptocurrency trading & cryptowallet service with remarkably low commission fees. Another notable selling point for this platform is partnerships with celebrities that are known in the crypto world. Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Vitalii Buterin, Warren Buffet – the site says about being supported by them. To make these claims look real, frauds use deepfake videos where those celebrities advertise the scam as if it was the best thing in the world. Obviously, Elon Musk is the most common choise for that. But, as I said in the introduction, all this is just a vivid wrap around an obvious scam.

Xlinkopen Scam

Initially, Xlinkopen shares the design of multiple equivalent pages. There are quite a few examples, like Valmarod, Spaceuam or Smartxbit. They are completely undistinguishable in terms of graphic elements, with minor discrepancies in the webpage header. Other particulars, and sometimes even crypto wallet addresses, are unchanged. Probably, all these scam online platforms are operated by the same group of fraudsters.

Cryptocurrency Scam Summary

How the Xlinkopen Scam Works?

Xlinkopen is a part of a significant cryptocurrency scam scheme that started circulating actively in 2023. Rascals who stand behind it use numerous website designs, which still share the identical 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 legitimacy of the website. But let’s review them one by one.

Step 1: Promotion

To start the scam, criminals set up and fill accounts on well-liked social media platforms. They primarily aim at Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. Subsequently, the advertising campaign begins. Using bots and paid promotions (when feasible), fraud actors increase the presence of their scam activities to possible victims. And as I said, fraudsters do not disdain using generative AI for creating videos with the mentioned celebs that promote their scam to the public. To boost the folks even more, deceivers claim the bonus for every user who joins the service immediately.

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

Step 2: Gaining Traffic

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

This is the last stage when it is possible to skip the scam without any losses. Before you register using your personal information, rascals will not earn even a penny from your presence on the website.

Step 3: Data Gathering

This is the starting poing of the main fraud action. As I just said, deceivers bait folks into registration for bonuses. And all the personal data needed for it – username, email, cryptocurrency wallet address – is valuable for user identification. Solely by gathering this info and selling it further into the Darknet, crooks can earn quite a penny. Still, their plans go much further.

As it turns out, the alleged bonus is not available for withdrawal right away. To make at least cryptocurrency purchases on the platform with it, you need to top up the account with the equivalent sum. And this is what starts the final step of the scam.

Step 4: Requesting funds

Obviously, any cryptocurrency operations require having capital on your account. In the case of Xlinkopen, users are also coerced to top up to get the bonuses. And these top ups 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 engaging on this website hoping to use all the transferred money and withdraw them.

This is where the first obvious issues start to surface. When keeping an eye on the actual crypto wallet vs what the site says, you can observe that no transactions are done whatsoever. And then, when you’d try to retrieve the funds from your account, the scam is finally uncovered to the user.

Step 5: Escaping from Funds Withdrawal

Needless to say that fraudsters have zero intentions to give your money back. Though to make it look more legitimate, they’ve crafted a whole pack of reasons to decline the wireout request. Usually, they repeat what KYC regulations say, but in this case they are here exclusively to make the withdrawal impossible.

By asking for your personal info, deceivers just stall hoping for you to understand that you’ve been scammed 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 every check 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 Xlinkopen.com. Actually, there are a lot of scams that fall under the same points, so they are pretty much universal.

• Absent company details. Xlinkopen 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 Xlinkopen 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 Xlinkopen, 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 Xlinkopen is a definite scam.

What Should I do as a Victim?

If you had to deal with Xlinkopen 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 duration of the scam, its actors may contact you with specific documents. Alternatively, they may suggest you to install “cryptocurrency wallet applications” or “browser extensions” to facilitate access to your cryptocurrency funds. As we earlier figured out, these deceivers have no intention of returning your money. So, what can these email messages and browser add-ons represent? Correct – this is another element of the scam designed to throw you into willingly running malicious programs onto your device.

Both plugins and attachments added to emails can serve as a shell for different malware. In this scenario, I expect the presence of spyware and stealers among all forms of threats. While it is not obligatory for scammers to distribute malware, the likelihood is always significant. As previously mentioned, their morality is of little concern, and their dignity is already seriously marred. They have no principles to give up and aim to maximize profits.

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