Scam check
Is this "recovery" offer a scam?
People who have already lost crypto are the favourite target of a second scam: "recovery agents" who promise the money back. Answer seven questions about the person or company that approached you and you will see which warning signs apply.
1. Did they contact you first — a message, a call, a comment under your post, an email — rather than you finding them yourself?
Real law firms and investigators do not hunt for victims in comments and direct messages. Lists of victims circulate among scammers, so a second approach after a loss is itself the warning sign.
2. Do they promise or guarantee that your money will come back?
Nobody can guarantee the return of crypto. It depends on where the funds went, how fast you acted and which country the receiving platform answers to. An honest answer always starts with "it depends, and here is what we can check".
3. Do they ask for money before anything has actually reached you — a "fee", "tax", "deposit", "gas", "insurance" or "unlock" payment?
This is the core of the recovery scam: the payment is the goal, not the recovery. After the first payment there is always a second one for a new reason. Legitimate work is paid for the work itself under a written agreement, and success-based fees are taken from money that has already reached you.
4. Do they want to be paid in cryptocurrency, gift cards, or to a private person’s card or account?
These payment routes are chosen because they cannot be reversed and leave no payer protection. A company that really exists has a business account and issues an invoice in its own name.
5. Have they asked for your seed phrase, private keys, a wallet connection, a code from a text message, or remote access to your computer or phone?
Any of these gives away control of everything you still have. No lawyer, investigator, exchange or police officer ever needs them — tracing is done from public addresses and transaction hashes alone.
6. Do they claim to be the police, the FBI, a regulator, a court or a known law firm — and you have not been able to confirm it through an official site or phone number you found yourself?
Impersonation is easy: letterheads, badges, case numbers and copied websites cost nothing. Check it the other way round — find the organisation’s official number yourself and ask whether such a case and such an employee exist. Authorities also never charge a fee to return your money.
7. Do they refuse to give you a written agreement with a company name and registration number — or push you to decide right now?
A written agreement and a registration number you can look up in the state register are the cheapest check there is. Hurry is a tool: "the funds will move in an hour" is said to stop you from checking.
This check runs entirely in your browser. Your answers are not sent to us, not saved and not visible to anyone. If you then decide to describe your case, you do that yourself in the form at the end — and only what you type there reaches our lawyers.
Questions we are asked
Can anyone legally guarantee the return of stolen crypto?
No. Blockchain transfers are final, so recovery depends on the funds reaching a platform that can freeze them and on a court or the authorities ordering the return. Anyone promising a guaranteed result is selling you a promise, not a service.
Is it a scam if they ask for payment at all?
Not by itself. Paid legal work is normal; what is not normal is a payment demanded before any funds reach you and described as a fee, tax, deposit or unlock cost. Honest fees are for defined work under a written agreement, and success-based fees come out of money already recovered.
I already paid a "recovery agent". Can I do anything?
Stop any further payments, save all correspondence and payment details, ask your bank about a chargeback or recall if you used a card or transfer, and include this episode in your police report. The payment route decides what is realistically possible.