The Crypto Scam Checklist: 12 Checks Before You Buy or Connect
Updated 2026-06-04 · 7 min read
Most crypto losses are preventable. Scams run on speed and FOMO — they profit from the few minutes you don't spend checking. This is a practical, do-it-before-you-buy checklist: twelve fast checks that filter out the overwhelming majority of rugs, honeypots and drainer sites. Run them in order; if a token fails the early ones, you can stop right there.
Checks on the token (do these first)
1. Is the liquidity locked or burned? If the team controls the liquidity pool, they can withdraw it in a single transaction and the price goes to zero. Confirm the LP is locked or burned before anything else — this is the most common rug.
2. Is the mint authority revoked? An active mint authority lets the team print unlimited new supply and dilute you to nothing. Fixed-supply tokens revoke it.
3. Is the freeze authority revoked (Solana)? An active freeze authority can lock your balance so you hold the token but can never sell. Reputable Solana tokens revoke it.
4. Can the token actually be sold? Run a live sell-simulation to rule out a honeypot — a contract where buys work but sells are blocked. The chart cannot tell you this.
5. What are the real buy and sell taxes? A hidden or extreme tax (especially a high sell tax) quietly drains you on every trade. Treat anything above roughly 10% with suspicion.
6. How concentrated are the holders? If a few non-locked wallets hold a large share of supply, a single sell can crater the price. Check the top-holder breakdown.
Checks on the people and the project
7. Who is the deployer, and what else have they launched? Open the contract creator on a block explorer and glance at its other tokens. A wallet with a trail of short-lived tokens is a serial rugger.
8. Is the contract verified, and do the claims hold up on-chain? 'Ownership renounced' and 'liquidity locked' mean nothing unless you can verify them on the blockchain. Don't take the project's word for it.
9. Is the hype manufactured? A brand-new anonymous team, a cloned website, a bot-filled chat and 'buy now or miss out' pressure are all engineered to stop you from doing the 30 seconds of checking that would protect you.
Checks before you connect or sign
10. Did you reach the site yourself? Never connect a wallet to a dApp you arrived at from a DM, a giveaway, or an unsolicited airdrop. Bookmark the real URLs and use them every time.
11. What exactly are you approving or signing? Read the approval amount and any signature request. Avoid unlimited approvals to unknown contracts, and reject signatures that reference tokens or spenders you didn't intend — that's how approval-scam wallet drainers work.
12. Are you using the right wallet? Keep a separate burner wallet for minting and experimenting, apart from your main holdings, so one bad signature can't drain everything you own.
Turn the checklist into one click
Checks 1–6 are exactly what an automated scanner reads from the blockchain in seconds. Paste any contract or mint address into the SafuScan Token Scanner and you get a SAFE / CAUTION / RISKY / AVOID verdict with the underlying signals — liquidity, authorities, holders, honeypot status and taxes — so you can spend your attention on checks 7–12, the human-judgment ones.
A clean scan lowers your risk; it is never a guarantee. But running this checklist — by hand or with a scanner — is the difference between an informed decision and a coin flip.
Run every check in this guide automatically in seconds — free, no wallet needed.
Frequently asked questions
Liquidity. If the liquidity isn't locked or burned, the team can withdraw the pool and send the price to zero in one transaction — the most common rug pull. Locked or burned liquidity removes that specific risk.
The on-chain checks (liquidity, authorities, holders, honeypot, taxes) take seconds with an automated scanner. The human checks — deployer history, manufactured hype, the site you're connecting to — take a couple of minutes. A few minutes routinely prevents total losses.
No. A clean scan means the common technical rug conditions aren't present right now — it is not financial advice or a guarantee. Contracts can change and markets are risky. Use it to avoid obvious traps, not as a green light.