Scams

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Occurs when the developers of a new token or DeFi project suddenly drain all the funds from the project's liquidity pool (often after an initial coin offering or sale) and disappear. The token's price crashes to near zero, leaving investors with worthless assets and no way to sell. Soft Rug Pulls refer to the gradual draining of liquidity, while Hard Rug Pulls are sudden and complete liquidations. This is highly prevalent on Solana, especially with meme coins

 A malicious smart contract (or token) that is designed to allow users to buy the token but prevents them from selling it. The code is structured to only allow certain addresses (controlled by the scammer) to withdraw or sell, effectively trapping the victim's funds and creating an artificial price chart with many "buys" and few "sells." 

 Fraudsters coordinate to heavily promote a low-value token (often on social media or Telegram groups), creating hype to drive up the price. Once the price reaches a peak, the scammers abruptly sell off their large holdings, "dumping" the token and crashing the price, leaving the remaining investors with heavy losses. 

 Scammers create fake websites, emails, or direct messages that perfectly mimic legitimate Solana wallets (like Phantom) or reputable DeFi platforms. They trick users into connecting their wallet or, more dangerously, entering their Seed Phrase/Secret Recovery Phrase or Private Key, which allows the scammer to instantly empty the victim's wallet of all tokens. 

Fraudsters create fake social media accounts (e.g., on X/Twitter or Telegram) impersonating a celebrity, major influencer, or official Solana entity. They advertise fake "giveaways" or "airdrops," promising to double any SOL sent to a specific wallet address. Once the victim sends their funds, the tokens are never returned.

 A long-con where the scammer builds a romantic or friendly relationship with the victim over weeks or months (social engineering). Once trust is established, the scammer convinces the victim to invest in a fraudulent, high-yield crypto trading platform or "bot" that is actually controlled by the scammer, ultimately draining the victim's funds. 

 Scammers send a tiny, zero-value transaction to the victim's wallet from an address that is carefully generated to have the same first and last few characters as one of the victim's frequent, legitimate transaction addresses. When the victim goes to send funds later, they mistakenly copy the scammer's "poisoned" address from their transaction history instead of typing or verifying their intended one, sending their funds to the scammer. 

 This often accompanies phishing. A scammer tricks a user into connecting their wallet to a fraudulent dApp and signing a malicious transaction known as a "wallet drainer." This grants the scammer a blanket permission (token approval) to spend all of the user's tokens from their wallet at any time, which they use to steal the funds. 

 Victims are lured into deploying a "smart contract" (often advertised as an easy-to-use trading or arbitrage bot) that promises passive income. The contract's code is secretly malicious; once the victim funds the contract or approves a transaction, the hidden code automatically siphons their crypto to the scammer's address.