比特币和其他数字产品本质上是一项投资，我们中的许多人都不会用来购买杂货或汽油

大约11年前，当丹尼斯·赫恩（Dennis Heun）报告了美国银行家的付款网络和数据安全时，我参加了芝加哥的一次比特币会议，该会议实际上是在吹捧加密货币并回答好奇的访问者的问题。

About 11 years ago, I attended a bitcoin conference in Chicago while reporting on payments networks and data security for American Banker. The event essentially touted cryptocurrency and answered questions from curious onlookers.

大约11年前，我参加了芝加哥的一次比特币会议，同时报告了美国银行家的支付网络和数据安全性。该事件实质上吹捧着加密货币，并回答了好奇的围观者的问题。

One question and its answer come to mind again today because wealthy folks who have been pushing bitcoin and other digital products for a long time view the current president and his administration as avid supporters.

一个问题及其答案今天再次想到，因为很长一段时间以来一直将比特币和其他数字产品推向现任总统及其政府狂热的支持者的富人。

The question at that conference was “Who runs bitcoin?” The answer was “No one! This is one of the beauties!”

该会议的问题是“谁经营比特币？”答案是“没人！这是美女之一！”

Well, OK. Not an answer that would excite me, but to get more specific, it meant bitcoin is an open-source software that anyone can use and build on. That is, essentially, what it was then and is now. Years ago, of course, that brought frowns from traditional bankers and payments execs, but high-fives from folks building applications and services as part of this new ecosystem.

好，好。这不是会激发我的答案，而是要更具体，这意味着比特币是一个可以使用和构建的开源软件。也就是说，当时是什么，现在是什么。当然，几年前，这引起了传统的银行家和付款高管的皱眉，但作为该新生态系统的一部分，人们的frows forks frows frows frows frows frows frows frows。

My point here is to provide insights gained from more than a decade of writing about digital coins and talking to coin company CEOs and fraud experts.

我的观点是提供从十多年的数字硬币撰写和与Coin Company Ceos和欺诈专家交谈的十多年中获得的见解。

Rather than taking a deep dive into the process of the bitcoin “mining” hardware that monitors creation of a bitcoin, confirms transactions and helps keep them secure, it makes more sense for this column to just warn folks about scams that use crypto as a lure.

与其深入深入研究比特币“采矿”硬件的过程，该硬件可以监视创建比特币，确认交易并有助于确保它们的安全，而是该专栏更有意义地警告人们有关使用Crypto的骗局的骗局。

Overall, the digital coin process has some good security points, but not enough to thwart the most troubling aspects of any cryptocurrency — that its value essentially rises on knee-jerk impulses of buyers with not a whole lot at its foundation to help it bounce back after a deep downturn, and that criminals love digital currency as not only something to steal but also to hide behind to cover up crimes.

总体而言，数字硬币流程具有一些良好的安全点，但还不足以阻止任何加密货币的最令人不安的方面 - 其价值本质上是在膝盖 - 乔克（Jer-jerk）的冲动上上升的买家，其基础并没有大量的基础来帮助它反弹。经过深深的衰退，犯罪分子不仅将数字货币视为要偷东西，而且还躲在后面以掩盖犯罪。

It’s not as easy to trace their activities (remember the part about no one is in charge of bitcoin?), and they can dump the value when their deeds are done or, worse, take your money through a fake crypto app.

追踪他们的活动并不容易（还记得没有人负责比特币的部分？），当他们的事迹完成时，他们可以将价值丢弃，或者更糟糕的是，通过假的加密应用程序将您的钱拿走。

I checked in with Julie Conroy, a fraud and security expert whom I leaned on often when writing about these things. In her role as Chief Insights Officer for Boston- and London-based Datos Insights, she has seen it all.

我与朱莉·康罗伊（Julie Conroy）签到了欺诈和安全专家朱莉·康罗伊（Julie Conroy）。她担任波士顿和伦敦Datos Insights的首席见解官，她已经看到了一切。

“Scams are on the rise across all payment methods,” Conroy said. “Scammers prefer to receive funds via payment mechanisms that are non-refutable. That’s why gift cards, real-time payment rails, and cryptocurrency are among their preferred ways of receiving funds.”

康罗伊说：“在所有付款方式中，骗局都在增加。” “骗子更喜欢通过不可解释的付款机制获得资金。这就是为什么礼品卡，实时付款导轨和加密货币是他们首选获得资金的方式之一。”

Conroy has always contended a significant danger is that “most people think that scams are somebody else’s problem and it would never happen to them.”

康罗伊（Conroy）始终争辩说，“大多数人认为骗局是别人的问题，这永远不会发生在他们身上。”

Her company’s research tells a different story, noting that one in three Americans were victimized by some sort of scam in the past couple of years.

她公司的研究讲述了一个不同的故事，并指出过去几年中，三分之一的美国人被某种骗局受害。

“One of the more prevalent and devastating forms of scams combines a romance scam with cryptocurrency, often resulting in five- or six-figure losses for the victims,” she said.

她说：“骗局的最普遍和毁灭性的形式之一将浪漫史骗局与加密货币结合在一起，通常会给受害者带来五位或六位数的损失。”

A YouTube video from software engineer and “scambaiter” Jim Browning, who is dedicated to bringing down organized crime behind crypto and other scams, explains how a dating app scam essentially uses gorgeous ladies to lure gullible folks into a relationship.

软件工程师和“ Scambaiter” YouTube视频致力于将有组织的犯罪在加密货币和其他骗局背后降低，他们解释了约会应用程序骗局如何使用华丽的女士将可笑的人诱使人们陷入恋爱关系。

Part of that relationship includes the lady convincing her new partner that they can make a lot money together through a crypto exchange.

该关系的一部分包括那位女士说服她的新伴侣，他们可以通过加密交易所一起赚很多钱。

The fake site looks legitimate, showing users how to buy and sell digital coins “without risk.”

假网站看起来合法，向用户展示了如何“无风险”买卖数字硬币。

That’s a red flag, Browning notes, asking the question, “What investment ever made has not carried some risk?”

布朗宁指出，那是一个危险信号，问：“哪些投资没有带来一些风险？”

Still, many make the plunge and lose a fortune. They buy coins for their new “love” and that is the last they see of the money or the lady.

尽管如此，许多人还是跌入了一笔财富。他们为新的“爱”购买硬币，这是他们对钱或女士的最后一次。

There are hundreds of other scams, of course, many that start right in our email inbox or via a text message.

当然，还有数百个骗局在我们的电子邮件收件箱或通过短信中开始。

If we have to be careful about this sort of thing, there are many asking that President Donald Trump and his followers do the same on a larger scale, even as bitcoin value soars and the president has had his own “meme coin” created and placed in the market. It’s a development that has some of his crypto supporters wary of what is next, especially because the Trump coin’s value will rise and fall with this popularity.

如果我们必须谨慎对待这种事情，许多人问唐纳德·特朗普总统和他的追随者在更大范围内做同样的事情，即使比特币的价值飙升和总统拥有自己的“模因硬币”在市场上。这一发展使他的一些加密支持者对接下来的情况保持警惕，尤其是因为特朗普硬币的价值将随着这一普及而上升和下降。

Bitcoin and products like it are essentially an investment, not something many of us would use, nor enough merchants would accept, to buy groceries or gas.

比特币和类似的产品本质上是一项投资，我们中的许多人都不会使用，也没有足够的商人购买杂货或天然气。

The value rises and falls on the whims of the crowd and raw human emotion, not on a company’s earnings call, inflation or unemployment stats.

该价值上升并落在人群的异想天开和原始的人类情感上，而不是公司的收入电话，通货膨胀或失业统计数据。

Sure, the stock markets fluctuate, but safeguards are in place and companies generally have plans to get back on track. Long-term, the stock market does just fine for itself. Digital coins lack that foundation.

当然，股票市场波动，但保障措施已经到位，公司通常有计划重回正轨。长期，股票市场本身就可以了。数字硬币缺乏该基础。

Some in the industry suggest our enemies could be licking their chops at the prospect of buying up a lot of digital coins to drive up their value and thus suck many Americans to follow that trend, then pull out their investment and crash the value. Or simply rob

行业中的一些人表明，我们的敌人可能正在舔碎石，以购买许多数字硬币以提高其价值，从而吸引许多美国人来遵循这一趋势，然后撤出投资并崩溃价值。或简单地抢劫