All the evidence given here is extracted from open sources. All this is very easy to verify. It contains simply names that are easily found on the Internet. There is no data on their personal lives. Here, only public data, which they themselves left on the Internet.
What happened: Illegal exchanger from Russia(the activities of such services are not legal in Russia) hold my funds and do all to delay the situation. They demand documents, selfie, video verification. But I am not obliged to disclose information about myself to a group of persons who conduct illegal activities in its country. It's just dangerous.
Scammers Profile Link: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=1307188
Reference Link: https://changenow.io/
Amount Scammed: 100 BCH / 11 BTC / $70 000
Payment Method: BCH
Proof of Payment: Dear friends I don't want to publish my wallet address. However, fraudsters do not deny the problem(you can see this in next posts). But in any case, I can show my wallet to any moderator.
PM/Chat Logs: Again, fraudsters do not deny the problem. Of course I have a long long dialogue through email, but it's too big.
Additional Notes: I advise you to not deal with this user until this dispute is resolved.
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UPDATE 2018-07-15
They still have not returned my funds. I remind you I sent all the photos they needed 9 days ago. They say that they are conducting an investigation. They themselves say that they do not know how long it will take. In other words, they say:
"We took your funds, and we will not return it to you until we want."
But what kind of investigation can be conducted by these anonyms for more than 9 days? Blockchain shows that I own funds for 5 years. The presence of many coins on my wallets indicates that private keys were not stolen. What else can they investigate? There is no doubt that they are just trying to find a way to leave this funds to themselves. I'm sure they just wait until we all shut up and everyone will forget about it.
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UPDATE 2018-07-18
They still have not returned my funds. I remind you I sent all the photos they needed 12 days ago. They say that they are conducting an investigation... in the time when blockchain shows that I own funds for 5 years. The presence of many coins on my wallets indicates that private keys were not stolen.
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UPDATE 2018-07-19
I told them that I found absolutely all the information about them: names, phones, office address. And suddenly they decided to take the investigation to an end and arrange a video call with me. I would have agreed to this 2 weeks ago. But now it's too late. Now we will play by my rules.
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GRAND UPDATE OF THE POST WITH INFO ABOUT SCAMMERS 2018-07-22
More than two weeks ago I opened ChangeNOW.io and tried to exchange 100 BCH for 11 bitcoins. Why did I come to this site with such a huge amount? I confused them with Changelly, which I once worked with. And this was only part of the total amount of exchange.
After I sent BCH, the exchange was suspended and I was asked for a image of the passport and an explanation of the origin of the funds. I wrote my indignation to them. But when a man with a Russian name Sergey answered me, I tensed. If this is a service from Russia, then why should it establish the identity of a person with such a large volume of coins?
What purpose do they have in the time when the transaction itself could not cause any suspicion (other than volume)? This is not for them to be formally protected from regulators, since in Russia it is not regulated by anyone and they work illegally. I decided that it was just a formality. I took an image with someone's passport from google-images and sent them. And also I explained the origin of the funds, although there is nothing to explain, everything is already visible:
- There is only one incoming transaction(a few months ago) and one outgoing transaction(to ChangeNow.io) on the wallet.
- The origin of funds on this wallet is my another wallet. This wallet was created 5 years ago(before bitcoin hardfork) and it replenished only once(5 years ago).
- The presence of many coins on my wallets indicates that private keys were not stolen
But after that they asked to send selfie with a passport. There was no way out and I had to make a real selfie with a real passport. They accused me that I deceived them and now they will conduct an investigation. That was 2 weeks ago. All the days during these weeks they said that they are investigating this situation and can not say about the completion time
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4647308.msg42029743#msg42029743
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4647308.msg42084499#msg42084499
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4647308.msg42411130#msg42411130
The same thing was said to me when communicating by mail within 2 weeks. Do you understand cynicism? Absolutely anonymous people, without a company, addresses, telephone, working illegally, appropriated my funds and in fact declare that they will return it only when they themselves want it.
They said it until 2018-07-20. This is explained by the fact that on Thursday I told them that I found all the information about them: their names, phone numbers, office address. I said that the information about them will be published and then forwarded to the competent bodies of St. Petersburg, as they, having organized de facto anonymous exchange service of anonymous currencies (only I probably did not have the luck with my volume) brazenly violates the laws of the Russian Federation. After that they immediately wanted to communicate with me on video communication. And now they are blackmailing: "that's when you call us, then we will decide about your funds."
But I do not like this approach. Persons who conduct completely illegal entrepreneurial activities in Russia, trying to steal funds from those who feed them, have no right to demand anything to me. I will not please them. I do not worry about my funds, I'll return it in any case, it's just that I will not leave anything from their "business" and from their personal reputation.
Please understand me correctly. I do not gloat simply because they work illegally in Russia. It's just a convenient hook. But I would never used it if they did not try to steal my funds. You, having at least six months from registering on the forum, think: what 2 weeks investigation can be carried out by a group of people doing their business illegally in the time when the blockchain shows that I own the funds for 5 years, and the presence of many coins on my wallets says that private keys were not stolen. What investigation? It's clear even for a fool, that this is a lie and an attempt to delay the time to the maximum in the hope that the person will fall behind and the topic will be forgotten.
I repeat, I have absolutely nothing against services that work in the shadow of the state. Not all states have perfect legislation. But if you work illegally and yet have no honor, trying to brazenly steal, then do not think that you will get away with it.
Evidence that Roman Lapin and Sergey Sokratilin are the main persons in ChangeNOW.io
Let's open whitepaper of their tokens.
https://changenow.io/files/WhitePaper._NOW_Token._v1.2.pdf?v=1.23
At the very end you will see the following text
Team
Roman L, CEO, has 12+ years of development experience on the edge with management
skills. He has built 2 development companies from scratch. Has more than two years in
experience in blockchain and cryptocurrencies. His background allows him to improve
ChangeNOW service daily while building the most handy exchange interface ever.
Sergey S, Product Manager. Having a degree in physics, Sergey has some brilliant skills in
product management. This outstanding mix allows Sergey to improve ChangeNOW on a
daily basis. The team calls him simply Socrates.
Peter S, Lead Developer, is a blockchain enthusiast...
Denis K, Full Stack Developer, with 3+ years of experience in the blockchain industry...
I did not touch the developers, since I think they hardly understand what their leaders are doing.
Roman Lapin:
https://angel.co/www-changenow-io-1/jobs/334321-community-manager-for-a-crypto-exchange
As it is characteristic of all cowardly scammers, only after sensing the danger, they immediately began to sweep the tracks. But since I have been on the Internet for a long time and I met a lot of such scammers, I knew this and made screenshots before notifying them about the imminent publication of these materials:
https://postimg.cc/image/pm21aqpup/
If you do not believe me and think that this is photoshop, then type in Google (not yet reindexed):
ROMAN LAPIN https://angel.co/www-changenow-io-1/jobs/334321-community-manager-for-a-crypto-exchange
And he personally
https://angel.co/roman-lapin
https://postimg.cc/image/lqyn841j5/
Again, if you do not believe me, then type in Bing (Google does not have this page)
CHANGENOW https://angel.co/roman-lapin
Also you can type in Google
linkedin changenow lapin
And then you can see the folowing result:
"Roman Lapin - CEO - ChangeNOW | LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/romalapin/
View Roman Lapin's profile on LinkedIn, the world's largest professional community. Roman has 10 jobs listed on their profile. See the complete profile on ..."
Now he has already deleted the information about ChangeNOW from his page.
As you see, this person appears himself as CEO of this service.
It was easy to find his pages in social networks
https://www.facebook.com/romalapin
https://vk.com/romalapin
http://romalapin.com/
This man is from Petersburg. He also leads the small IT company Evercode Lab
https://evercodelab.com/
St. Petersburg, Ligovsky prospect, 50, building 13, office 28, +7 812 646-96-32
I am absolutely sure that the exchanger ChangeNOW.io is developed and managed from this office in the center of St. Petersburg.
Sergey Sokratilin:
And let's move on to one more person. Obviously, this is the second person in the organization and it is he who answers by email on behalf of Sergey.
https://mmgp.ru/showthread.php?t=565503
"Сергей Сократилин, главный менеджер ChangeNow, прокомментировал добавление ADA на обменник (Sergey Sokrutilin, ChangeNow's main manager, commented on adding ADA to the exchanger:)"
https://vk.com/sokrats The team calls him simply Socrates
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001779076373
https://www.facebook.com/sergei.sokratilin
As you can see, he is also from Petersburg.
Roman Lapin and Sergey Sokratilin are mutual friends in social networks.
I think no one will doubt that these people, being in Russia, run the illegal for Russia crypto-exchanger ChangeNOW.io.
You ask me what I plan to do with all of this. I do not know yet. Of course, I'm considering only legitimate ways of fighting. Also, I would not like to participate in some courts in person, but this option is not excluded. In the end, they may come to their senses and return what they do not own.
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UPDATE 2018-07-23
The scammers are too fast. They have already corrected their PDF WhitePaper (they removed last page with the names)
This is previous version:
https://nofile.io/f/WM6hw9ZdNkS/WhitePaper._NOW_Token._v1.2.pdf
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UPDATE 2018-08-13
They fled their office a week ago.
St. Petersburg, Ligovsky prospect, 50, building 13, office 28
And when someone calls +7 812 646-96-32, Konstantin Brumm refuses to give a new address
"Konstantin Brumm is CEO of Evercode at now when Roman Lapin is founder of Evercode(and CEO of ChangeNOW) but both work together. Evercode is developer of ChangeNOW
https://evercodelab.com/
EVERCODE LAB Ltd
OGRN: 1137847068017
INN: 7804502846
Legal address: St. Petersburg, Brianceva str, 7, office 613
Founders:
50% Sergeev Petr Konstantinovich (Also this person is "Lead Developer, is a blockchain enthusiast..." (the information from NOW token WhitePaper ))
14.02.2013 , INN 471421285013
50% Lapin Roman Dmitrievich
14.02.2013 , INN 290131772518
CEO
Brumm Konstanin Aleksandrovich
22.02.2018, INN 471505717005"
They call yourself a legitimate business. Why do they run away from the office and keep the new address a secret? What are they afraid of? After all, they have everything under the law and Russian police will protect them. So what is the problem?