
Stellar account with more than one million stellars - SandroG
https://www.stellar.org/viewer/#live/everettforth
======
everettForth
Hi everyone,

I'm just excited about Stellar, and buying it early on. I'm also a software
engineer, so if anyone has some cool ideas for things that could be built with
a large stellar wallet, please let me know.

I'm especially interested in things Greg Brockman has been talking about
lately, like this gateway, and making up his own currency:
[https://stripe.com/blog/bitcoin-the-stripe-
perspective](https://stripe.com/blog/bitcoin-the-stripe-perspective)

~~~
wlv

        SandroG 1 hour ago
        
        I'm in touch with Stellar developers, and they confirmed
        that this individual is indeed gaming the system.
    

Response? Sounds like defamation.

~~~
everettForth
I almost didn't even want to comment on this, but it really isn't a big deal.
It looks like a screenshot taken out of context of someone who sent a private
message asking someone to look at my account.

~~~
Kiro
Are you gaming it or not?

~~~
gdb
He's not gaming it.

~~~
jqueryin
Then how did he come across 300+ individuals willing to sell him their entire
account so quickly?

~~~
gdb
Mechanical Turk, I believe:
[https://twitter.com/thegdb/status/495656012343300097](https://twitter.com/thegdb/status/495656012343300097).
There's a decent exchange rate: more than a dollar per account.

~~~
SandroG
2 thoughts:

1) None of the accounts listed on the Mechanical Turk's HITs are pointing to
everettforth

2) None of the accounts referenced in these HITs have a growing balance

------
alex1
Why did Stellar decide on using Facebook accounts to enforce the one account
per person rule, instead of something better like mobile numbers? There are
more people with cell phones than there are with Facebook accounts. Acquiring
large batches of phone numbers to game the system is harder since it costs
money and is more easily detectable.

Even if this guy isn't gaming the system with fake Facebook accounts, I'm sure
others already are.

~~~
everettForth
Facebook has nothing to do with this.

If everyone on Earth were given 5000 Stellars right now, how many people do
you think would be willing to sell all of their Stellars for a beer?

It's basic economics.

------
jtokoph
EDIT: This actually doesn't work, but I thought I was being clever.

For those mentioning needing Facebook accounts. It looks like you don't need a
Facebook account to game the reward system.

Assume a person has a main account (user1) with at least 1050 STR.

1\. Create a New Account (user2)

2\. Transfer 1050 STR from user1 -> user2

3\. Transfer 1000 STR from user2 -> user1

4\. Stellarfoundation makes 1000 STR deposit into user2

5\. Send newly acquired 1000 STR from user2 -> user1

Starting balance: 1050 STR

Ending balance: 2000 STR

~~~
gdb
No, that doesn't actually work (just double checked to make sure). Would be a
clever hole though :).

~~~
manojlds
As soon as I signed up, I was thinking of this hole. So why doesn't it work?
Is it that you are not permitted to transfer back the money?

~~~
gdb
Nah, just that the stellarfoundation bot checks that you're Facebook-authed
before sending over your 1,000 stellar bonus.

------
ghshephard
Note, this particular user is willing to sell 100K stellars for $200.

Fun times watching a market being made in the early days....
[https://forum.stellar.org/t/selling-100-000-stellars/716](https://forum.stellar.org/t/selling-100-000-stellars/716)

------
smoyer
Stellar itself seems to be scamming people:

"50% of the total will be distributed to people who sign up for an account."

Once you sign up for an account, you find out that you only receive stellars
if you log in with Facebook ... if you want to build trust, you should be more
transparent. You also need some way of including users who don't have Facebook
(and/or Google) accounts.

~~~
gdb
Yeah, the plan is definitely to expand beyond Facebook in the medium term. It
was just the fastest (though an imperfect) way of getting started and getting
stellars into the hands of as many people as possible, as quickly as possible.
See also
[https://www.stellar.org/faq/#_Why_do_I_need_to_authenticate_...](https://www.stellar.org/faq/#_Why_do_I_need_to_authenticate_with_Facebook_to_receive_my_stellars_).

~~~
eaurouge
So when do you plan on doing this? I signed up in the hopes of receiving a
distribution only to find I needed an aged Facebook account to claim it.

------
SandroG
EverettForth's response: [How I Accumulated 2-Million Stellar in Less Than 24
Hours]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8126282](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8126282)

Everett's response is much appreciated. If I remember correctly, he asked
mTurkers to create a Stellar account _without_ an identifiable account name so
the transaction couldn't be easily backtracked. Also, he did not use his real
name in mTurk and impersonated someone else. Not sure if his actions violated
the ToS.

It was right for Everett to have come forward and disclose his means. His
suggestions to improve the system are excellent. It will improve the Stellar
system for everyone involved. Nevertheless, I believe that he should donate
his balance to a charity. It will be an honorable thing to do.

Sandro

------
MiWDesktopHack
This is a new 100% premined cryptocurrency from the makers of ripple. Stripe
has invested in this technology; so it already has some fiat backing behind
the haul.

Whomever this is, and they are likely associated with the project as have an
associated email, is gathering funds from the projects premined wallets for
distribution. Like ripple, they are handing these out to people interested in
the technology. I received part of the initial distribution of ripple by
posting on the bitcoin forums. I encourage you to make an account, nothing to
lose here; the initial distribution of the currency helps with its
decentralization.

Paypal used to pay people to make new accounts too!

~~~
gdb
The person here is not affiliated with the project. (That @stellar.org is
their federated payment address, which is assigned to anyone who signs up for
an account.)

We've talked with the user, and it sounds like this is not in fact a code bug.
We've invited him to post more details in this thread, so hopefully you'll
hear more soon.

------
redschell
Wow, I saw his post earlier on the Stellar subreddit and thought he was full
of it, but would you look at that. Here's the post:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/thestellar/comments/2cebkm/selling_1...](http://www.reddit.com/r/thestellar/comments/2cebkm/selling_100000_stellars/)

Some people have been offering web consulting services in exchange for
stellars, but no details yet on how this guy built his wealth.

------
gojomo
I could have missed it, but didn't notice a disclosure on Stellar sign-up that
usernames and balances would be discoverable this way.

------
EarthLaunch
Now we might see whether it's centralized.

~~~
wlv
They locked his forum thread temporarily and then decided against it. I wonder
if they froze his account too.

------
natch
What does this mean? Anyone care to explain?

~~~
ghshephard
Right now, stellars are being handed out at 5K, if you are willing to give
them a facebook login. This person is acquiring 100K/stellars an hour, which
equals 20 facebook logins/hour.

~~~
curiousAl
Why would this be hard to spoof? What's required here?

Multiple Facebook accounts and a quick script?

~~~
adamnemecek
It seems like you have to had the account for a while. But yeah, far from
perfect protection regardless.

~~~
glimcat
People with networks of fake accounts routinely set them up in advance & run
simulated activity.

This is normally used for e.g. selling fake likes. It's taken as a given that
you will have regular churn as accounts are detected, occasionally high spikes
of turnover as fraud detection and safeguards change, that kind of stuff.
Often the action of converting network behavior into currency activity is what
burns accounts.

Given an alternative way of rapidly converting part of that network into a
compelling quantity of USD, and the fact that you're routinely rotating
accounts anyway...offering to pay money or money-equivalents for Facebook
connections in an automated fashion is pretty much screaming for fraudsters to
call in the biggest airstrike they can before you come to your senses.

~~~
adamnemecek
Yeah, I'm well aware of that. I was answering the 'what's required' part.

------
Brajeshwar
Update: Done. No Worries. If you have no friends and need to complete the
steps; willing to help by sending you back the stellars.

I'll send you stellar, you send me stellar. Let's complete their final step.
Stellar username "oinam".

------
SandroG
Based on all available documentation about Stellar, it is impossible to accrue
so much Stellars so quickly, and so consistently, without somehow gaming the
system. Anyone willing to prove me wrong?

------
ztnewman
What is stellar and how is this proof of anything?

~~~
myhf
A new cryptocurrency backed by Stripe. Yesterday's discussion thread:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8114901](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8114901)

------
lmartel
Well, proof that someone has a lot of stellars.

He could be gaming the Facebook promotion, or buying them, or stealing them,
or _____

~~~
SandroG
You can only associate one Facebook profile to a Stellar account.

~~~
iLoch
So if you have 20 Facebook accounts and it takes you 3 minutes per account,
that's 100K Stellar/hr.

~~~
ghshephard
They can't be new facebook accounts, need to have been around for a while.

~~~
dlubarov
There are plenty of people in the black hat community with aged Facebook
accounts that they're willing to sell.

~~~
joeyspn
And also there's the "click farms" where they have __millions __of fake
profiles for selling likes and build followers.

Facebook estimates that between 5.5% and 11.2% of profiles are fake [0]. With
1.32 Billion user base that means that up to 134 Million user profiles are
fake.

Someone is going to earn A LOT of stellars soon.

Talk about fair distribution... this has been a dumb move by the stellar team.
Ethereum guys have been smarter in this one..

[0] [http://thenextweb.com/facebook/2014/02/03/facebook-
estimates...](http://thenextweb.com/facebook/2014/02/03/facebook-
estimates-5-5-11-2-accounts-fake/)

------
ckdarby
It means someone is making a ton of money =D

------
dang
Can anyone suggest an accurate, neutral title? This one is outrageously over
the top. There's no "proof" of anything here.

Submitters: gratuitous scandal-mongering is not ok on Hacker News.

Edit: the submitted title was "Proof that someone is gaming Stellar. Growing
balance at 100K / hour"

~~~
ghshephard
Stellar Market Activity: user with more than 1million stellars

~~~
dang
Thanks. That seems both accurate and neutral, so we'll take your suggestion.

------
dav-
If anyone wants to complete the last step, if you send me the 1000 Stellars,
I'll send 900 back. Username is Davv. The first person to do it will get 1000
back (since I need to do it too)

