How to Spot a “Sleeping Volcano” Scam Channel in Telegram

Hello everyone, Pavluu here. I’ve tried to write this article several times, but always dropped it because the trend of “volcanization” of channels would fade and lose relevance. Now, however, there’s a new wave of “casino algorithm hackers” or just regular Neanderthals who think they’re geniuses at arbitrage. Today, I’ll tell you a bit about them and how to spot a “sleeping volcano”—a channel that’s 100% going to turn into a volcano and try to sell you their “amazing” schemes and fake payout screenshots from “winners” in the race for free cheese.

Quick Background for the Uninitiated

When a Subscriber Messages You

We’ve been covering the volcano scam since the very beginning of our channel. We wrote about it being a pure scam back in September 2017 and July 2018. The first to bring this plague was some info-hustler named Dima Ladesov (creator of the “Typical Millionaire” public page). He posted a whole guide on his Telegram channel about how to drive traffic, scam people with fake reviews, and attract fresh suckers by publishing these schemes. Later, he deleted the post and denied everything. Unfortunately, I was just starting my channel back then and didn’t think to save the article or take screenshots. The only trace is our September 2017 post where I mentioned Dima’s shady activities. Anyway, forget about him.

The Essence of the Scam

There are various affiliate programs that pay you for driving traffic. The simplest example is the AliExpress affiliate program, where you get a percentage of purchases made by people who click your links. By buying ads, you increase clicks and, therefore, your income.

But there are much juicier offers—like getting people to bet and deposit money. The most popular scam here is “beating the casino.” The affiliate program will even provide you with fake payout screenshots and testimonials. All you have to do is drive traffic and shamelessly lie to people, doing whatever it takes to get another “get-rich-quick” seeker to deposit and lose their money.

How Much Do Volcano Scammers Make?

There are lots of rumors and numbers floating around. Here’s a screenshot from a chat where someone honestly shared how much they make from this hustle:

Let me guess: you’re already thinking about starting your own scam volcano?

The History of the Battle

The “battle” between the darknet channel community and volcano scammers started back in summer 2017. That’s when Telegram was flooded with “Anti-Volcano” channels with similar avatars, spamming admins with requests to advertise their “Beat the Volcano,” “Rob the Casino,” “Secret Casino Algorithms” channels, etc.

Some admins, not realizing what was going on, sold them ads and then got angry comments from subscribers who, for some reason, didn’t become millionaires. Most darknet channel admins started scamming volcano scammers out of ad money as a kind of tradition. Someone would drop a link to a guy with a typical avatar, and everyone would pile on like hyenas. It was always amusing to me, and I understood it kept volcano scammers away from Telegram, but I never participated myself.

As for me and my team: we’re against volcano scams, but we’ve never scammed anyone out of money. We’d rather refuse ads and tell them to get lost. We don’t even advertise betting. Everyone earns as they can. A thinking person won’t fall for this crap, and a sucker will lose their money somewhere else if not here. Read our channel (and others) and grow your brain cells—everything will be fine.

After many volcano scammers got burned, things calmed down for a couple of months.

Dark_Adm

When volcano scammers got tired of losing money and constantly buying ads, a more cunning character appeared. I won’t give links, but many admins know him. He created a channel called ONION, posted various articles (some decent), and bought a lot of ads, boosting his numbers by 2,000–3,000 per campaign, as he admitted in chat. He grew suspiciously fast, and it was obvious he was faking numbers. The first to notice was Zakiya, admin of the DollaruBandit channel, who started an open war with Dark_Adm, accusing him of planning to turn his channel into a volcano. This drama went on for a long time, with posts against ONION and its eventual volcanization.

Admins started to worry: how do you tell who will become a volcano and who won’t?

How to Identify a Future “Darknet Volcano” Channel

1. No design or branding. The avatar is some random crap from Google, often with “darknet” or similar text. Lots of green numbers, hooded hackers, and other nonsense. Obvious red flag.
2. No effort in article descriptions. They just drop a link. “Eat up, sucker. We’ll hack the casino soon, just wait another week.”
3. Channel description always says “for informational purposes only,” “closed darknet forum,” or “not encouraging any actions.” Not a 100% sign, but a common pattern.
4. Recycled content. They have 30–40 articles that just circulate. You’ll see the same “8 anonymity programs,” “darknet glossary,” or “Tor sites” everywhere. Old, overused content.
5. No concept or idea. The channel is faceless. The admin doesn’t interact, doesn’t write greetings or descriptions. Just dumps links to articles, posts any ad, and waits for the right moment.
6. No design at all. The channel name isn’t on the avatar. No original logo or character. Posts use the same generic Google images.
7. Channel name almost always includes “Dark.” Classic. Zero creativity, though some legit channels also use “Dark.”
8. They often promote their other scam channels. They’ll say “we’re moving” or “opening a new channel,” creating clickbait and moving the audience to a new sleeping volcano.
9. No contact info in the description. Not always, but often. Even the most anonymous admins will list a bot for feedback or ad sales. These guys don’t care about either.
10. The admin “warms up” the audience. Promises VIP clubs, secret schemes, super arbitrage training, and other nonsense. Sometimes shows off “earnings” or invents a silly backstory before volcanizing. (Hi, Artyom!)

Below is one of the most “creative” examples of audience warm-up. They even mention Goebbels—what a circus.

These are the 10 signs of a future volcano. Again, this isn’t a 100% method, just my personal observations. I live and breathe this stuff and see it daily, so I’ve got a trained eye, haha.

Notorious Volcano Scammers

Artyom

Recently, a new volcano scammer known as Artyom appeared. No doxxing here—I have nothing personal against him, but he’s a key part of this new wave of volcanization in darknet channels.

He created the “Money Goat” and “Darka4” channels. After buying ads everywhere (including from me), he quickly volcanized, gaining about 30k subscribers on each “project.” Rumor has it his next project is DARKNETFLIX. In a chat, it was discussed that the “Mur`dark” channel was either his project or he bought it. I lean toward the latter. That channel was later renamed TROJAN and volcanized. The same logo appears in DARKNETFLIX, but I can’t say for sure it’s all the same story. But I wouldn’t be surprised.

You can spot Artyom by his writing style—he doesn’t even bother to change it. Same template every time. He also always posts the same screenshot of his “amazing” Sberbank balance. If you see this, run. After that, the channel will only have casino scam schemes. Yes, that’s the same screenshot from the “warming up the audience” example.

I’m not going to dig into which other channels he’s created or bought. As a Telegram admin, I can spot his channels right away. The point of this article isn’t about him specifically. It’s clear that most “dark-volcanoes” are his products and he’s the top volcano scammer right now, but he’s not the only one. He’s just part of the story, so enough about Artyom.

trol

I didn’t pay much attention to this guy, but it was obvious he’s also part of the volcano scammer crew. Some say he doesn’t run volcano scams himself but creates “darknet” channels and sells them—often to Artyom. Or maybe they work together. I don’t know for sure.

Here are some of his “creations”:

• Homedark (became a volcano on 04/07/19)
• Mur`dark (became a volcano this week, sold and renamed TROJAN)
• HACKAHOLIC (became a volcano and was sold)
• theD@rkNet (next in line)

This guy often pretends to be clueless when asked about volcano scams: “I just have a regular dark channel. I’m just starting out.” Yeah, right.

They’ve even come up with a new format for testimonials (or affiliate program): now they post video chats with “happy winners” who supposedly hit the jackpot! Evolution, huh. What’s next—billboard ads and street promoters handing out flyers with secret QR codes? 😀

Why Did I Write This Article?

This trend is killing the darknet niche, destroying audience loyalty, and making life harder for regular admins—especially newcomers, who will get scammed, accused of being future volcanoes, and generally trashed. All volcano scammers ruin trust in the messenger as a whole, making people associate it with scams. Someone gets burned once, loses money, and never comes back, not wanting to remember their mistake.

I just don’t want my audience to fall victim to this obvious scam. This article isn’t an investigation or an attack—just a warning for our readers. Be smart, don’t embarrass yourself with ideas about hacking casinos. I remind you of this from time to time. I’ve explained how it works and why these channels appear. Many of you have asked me privately why this happens. I hope you now understand.

Some Answers to Possible Questions

Why Should You Learn to Detect a Sleeping Volcano?

• You save your time by not wasting it on these projects.
• You immediately avoid getting scammed.
• You start to understand what quality content is.
• You begin to appreciate real materials and channels that put in effort for you.

Why Do Some Good Channels Get Sold to Volcano Scammers?

• Channel admins don’t develop their projects or buy ads, so their sales drop and they lose motivation. They don’t have the money to “boost” the channel again, or they just don’t want to invest anymore.
• Admins lose interest in the topic, and since there are no buyers, they sell to volcano scammers, who are the most frequent buyers. The seller doesn’t always know what will happen to the channel next.
• Admins sell channels urgently and for cheap. This can happen for various reasons, but selling a channel quickly is only possible to a close acquaintance or a volcano scammer. A buyer who doesn’t know you will spend days analyzing your stats, ads, content, etc. No one wants to buy a pig in a poke, especially on Telegram.
• Some admins are just greedy bastards who fall for a juicy price tag.

That’s all for now. The topic remains open, so I might write more if something interesting comes up.

Be smart and reasonable. Don’t let anyone feed you lies or garbage. Telegram is supposed to have a smart, discerning audience. I’d hate to see otherwise.