The group has an exchange logo for an avatar, a pinned post offering “spare slots in the next launch, 500 USDT each, closing tonight”, a few payout screenshots, and a moderator who sends a wallet address once you say yes.
Before weighing the logo or the screenshots, look at that address. Where the money lands tells you more than anything else in the post.
A launch or airdrop that an exchange runs inside its own app and website under published rules. The pitch above is illustrative and its numbers are made up. Official pages cited below were checked on 2026-09-10, and each programme's current page is the authority. Nothing here is investment advice.
01The formula has no slot in it
Binance wrote about a closely related pattern in an April 2024 security post: temporary Telegram groups and websites advertising tokens as “pre-sales”, which the post calls a clear deviation from official Launchpool practice. The same post says Launchpool can only be joined through the exchange's own app or website, and a programme claiming to be Launchpool outside the platform is most likely fake.
What official Launchpool looks like instead is written down. Binance's help-centre guide to getting started with Launchpool (published 2020-10-10, updated 2026-03-25) gives the hourly reward as (your locked amount ÷ total locked) × (today's pool airdrop ÷ 24). Balances are snapshotted several times an hour to produce an hourly average, and taking part requires a verified account and residence in an eligible jurisdiction.
Two quantities move in that formula: what you locked, and what everyone locked. Neither of them is a list of names. Nobody can bolt an extra share onto it for you, and there is no share to hand over in a chat. Snapshot-based airdrops follow the same logic, since the share comes from how your own balance behaved; how snapshots work breaks that down.
02If your country is on the excluded list
The getting-started guide also lists where residents currently cannot join Launchpool at all. The United States and its territories are on that list, and so are Canada, Australia, Japan, the Netherlands and New Zealand, among others (checked 2026-09-10).
For readers in those places, an offer to “get you into” a round means paying for a slot that does not exist and getting round the programme's eligibility rules as well. Don't use a VPN or false details to get round a regional limit; the footer of every page here says the same.
03Three pitches, one direction
- “Insider allocation” or “reserved share”. You pay a slot fee to a personal wallet or to another user's account ID. The money ends up with them.
- “We farm it for you and split the tokens.” You send your coins so they can “pool” them, or you hand over your login and verification codes. They end up with the coins, or with the whole account and everything else in it.
- “Presale price, pumps at listing.” You subscribe on a website or contract they supply, and the funds go to whoever controls it.
In all three, your side of the deal moves first. An official programme runs the other way round: locking and staking happen in an account in your own name, with no individual in between.
04Three checks before anything moves
- Destination. A personal wallet, someone else's account ID, or “top up on this platform first”: none of these is part of an official launch programme's flow.
- Entry point. Open the programme from the app you installed or an address you typed yourself, never from a link you were sent. If a group, account or site says it is official, look it up in Binance Verify. It takes website links, email addresses, phone numbers and Telegram handles, and you do not need an account to use it.
- The promise. The US Federal Trade Commission's consumer page on crypto scams (last updated May 2022) puts it plainly: “Only scammers will guarantee profits or big returns.” It adds that no legitimate business will ask you to send cryptocurrency in advance.
If any one of the three fails, you can stop there. The legitimate way to be early is to put the qualifying asset in the product or account the rules count before the counting period starts, read the rules on the official announcement page rather than in a chat summary, and work out the cost first with what an airdrop actually costs.
05Already paid, or already shared a login
- Stop at the next request. A “release fee”, “tax” or “deposit” demanded before withdrawal is a new payment request. Put it through the same three checks.
- Keep the evidence. Transaction hashes or internal transfer records, chat logs, wallet addresses and usernames. Screenshot them before you leave the group.
- If you shared login details, take the account back. Change the password, reset two-factor authentication, then review signed-in devices and API keys. If you also connected a wallet or signed an approval, how to spot a fake airdrop covers revoking it and moving what is left.
- Report it. Go to the police where you live, and contact the exchange only through the help or support link on its official website. Confirmed on-chain transfers usually cannot be reversed, so anyone offering to recover the funds for an upfront fee gets the same three checks.
This page explains how official programmes calculate shares and what common allocation pitches have in common. It does not represent any platform's current terms and cannot tell you whether a particular project is genuine. Taking part in launches carries price risk, and new tokens can open below their listing price. If something looks wrong, follow the platform's official channels and your local authorities. This is not investment advice.
Sources checked 2026-09-10. Binance pages cited are the English versions; formulas, eligibility and regions follow each programme's current rules. The FTC page is written for US consumers and is cited only for its general principles.