"When you want to help people, you tell them the truth. When you want to help yourself, you tell them what they want to hear." - Thomas Sowell

I am so sorry for having participated in the prosperity gospel of the Mega church of Cryptography, the gospel that states you may only talk positively about upcoming crypto protocols and projects and there is a dream that you can live passively on newly formed cryptocurrencies. I did what I did because who else was going to show you that yield? It wasn't a flex I swear, I thought I was helping. But I ate these words, "All CEXs have a past and you need to make your judgement based on past history. CEXs have been collapsing from Mt. Gox to Bitconnect it business as usual in the industry, the code is not the problem, people are. I went crawling back to my CEX of choice because I was getting beat up in DeFi, I know the risk and I accept it."

  On December 27, I woke up to check my earning on the Midas platform but to my surprise a bright red banner that said Midas closure: Reasons & Pivot to CeDeFi. All of the yield I had been generating for the past two months, poof gone! But this wasn't like Hodlnaut were the platform was frozen, my initial investment was still there and I was able to withdraw it. Okay Midas you wasted my time but at least you didn't completely screw me over like the others. -0.00714 BTC those were the paper gains I earned for the month no big deal, -0.00313 BNB hah laughable but -48.36732 BUSD that I would've harvested 3 days later: 'excuse me Ser... I was depending on that.' I withdrew the small amount of BNB first, I copied my address and pasted it then checked my email for the confirmation withdrawal code. Enter it and successful withdrew to my account.

  I cannot emphasize the amount of maleficence or malpractice that I exercised for the second withdrawal. I pressed ctrl v assuming that this would suffice for my address which it wouldn't because that last thing I copied was the withdrawal code. I did not check to make sure that it was the correct address. I copied the withdrawal code and confirmed it. 30 seconds elapsed but it's still not showing up in my wallet. I check my email for the withdrawal confirmation and hold up that's not my address. Oh shit, oh shit! (you know that sinking feeling where your heart drops from your chest to your stomach). Oh that sweet despair mixed in with utter panic.  I contacted Midas personnel and they told me there's nothing that can be done the transaction has been sent, they referred me to Binance because the withdrawal address is a contract of theirs.

  The Shakedown

Now the concern is where you copied the address from?

20:24

20:25

Yes that is a concern but can the funds be recovered?

If you have copied the deposit address from Binance, we can look in to it, If the address is copied from else where, we wont be able to check this information as we do not have access to the address if it is not copied from binance.

20:26

The address assigned to you form the exchange or wallet are unique for the platform you use.

20:27

I hope you understand what I am trying to say.

20:27

As long as you know where you copied the deposit address from you can reach the platform or wallet for support to recover the funds.

20:28

20:32

I copied the address from my metamask wallet. I had to confirm the withdrawal from my email with a code that was sent. I copied the code and pasted it and it withdrew. I looked at the email and the address was not my personal address.

Thank you for sharing this information with me.

20:32

As you had copied the address from metamask, I would humbly request you to contact the support of metamask and check with the on this matter and as to why the address was changed after you had copied and pastes it, Kindly provide them the txid and they will be able to help you further with the transaction details.

20:33

20:35

This address that I sent to is a Binance Contract 0xe9e7CEA3DedcA5984780Bafc599bD69ADd087D56

Alright let me check it for you

20:35

Could you also let me know the coin and value of it as well ?

20:36

20:37

4,017.81 BUSD

Thank you for your time binancian.

20:52

I understand that you have deposited BUSD to Binance and mistakenly deposit it to the contract address.

20:52

20:53

Yes that is correct

We might be able to retrieve your funds, however,

• The whole handling process time will be around 4 working days, as there are many similar requests and our technical team must handle each case individually.
• Due to the time and effort involved in manual retrieval, we will require a processing fee. The processing fee will be 500 BUSD or 5% of refundable amount, whichever is higher.

In case you agree, please let us know.

20:53

Kindly note that this handling fee is a fixed fee and this is a mandatory fee in order for the retrieval.

20:54

20:55

I just made a mistake and I know this takes up resources but is this the only recourse I have?

I offer you an apology for the discomfort you may have faced. Im really sorry for the situation binancian, And we can help you in this situation and we can help you to retrieve the funds.

20:56

But this fee is a fixed handling fee so, I'm really sorry but that is the minimum charge amount.

20:57

20:57

Okay I understand and accept

I would like to thank you for your patience and cooperation.

20:57

Give me a moment.

20:57

I found that at present you don't have enough 500 BUSD in your spot wallet. Please make sure that you set up this amount first. Then you can access this page: https://www.binance.com/en/my/wallet/uncredited_deposit/form and fill in your deposit information.

20:58

21:02

All my BUSD is in the contract address, can you just deduct from there when retrived?

I'm really sorry but we cannot do that. We are using the handling fee inorder for the retrieval this is the issue, So even though the handly fee can be covered by the retrieval but it needs to be paid first.

21:03

Is there a possibility for you to set up this amount.Because once our team successfully retrieved the amout it will be deposited to your accout.handling process time will be around 4 working days

 I was trying to get Binance to send the amount to my personal wallet but they were very adamant on sending the amount back to the sending address. I'm mean I just paid your extortion fee shouldn't you be at my leisure? They wanted proof that Midas had shutdown but rather then try to convince them I asked Midas support if they would be able to accept the transfer and they said no problem just send us the Transaction Tx. For the next week this is how I looked checking my Binance account.

  I really didn't know if Binance would honor the deal, I mean everything seemed legit but I was totally at their mercy.

  On December 31, 22 the transaction had gone through at 11:30 pm local time. I didn't know, Binance never sent an email confirming the transaction. I was relieved and I reconnected the with Midas support staff that had created my ticket and let them know. Max had said to give the tech team maybe 2 hours and check back. I did, still no deposit back in my account. When I contacted Max again saying, 'Well where's the deposit?' He immediately transferred me to another agent. They basically gave me the run around saying as soon as tech let them know then they would let me know. Up until this point I didn't realize Midas was a scam but I watched their slush fund hot wallet transfer millions of dollars back to binance addresses. I saw my transaction as the only deposit in an outflow of transactions.

  Some people have suggested that those took part in referral codes for now collapsed CeFi platforms are not accountable, they only did what everyone else was doing at the time. I don't participate in that kind of advertising, there is enough people participating I don't need to contribute. But I did give this platform my endorsement should I be held accountable if I lead you to your slaughter? I think you should have a check and balances on people who influence you. I am sorry my friend if I lead you to a poison well, keep note if I ever endorse something else if I did my own research on a platform, that I mitigated the possible risks.

  Here is what I learned from Midas' closure: Why would a successful platform adopt boost tier program that has been proven failure on all other platforms that have implemented it? Though the Midas token was a decent evaluation it had no utility what so ever, no reason to exist outside the platform. I didn't like how concentrated it was, there was only one way in and one way out. Do you know where the majority of scam tokens are created because of the low financial barrier? BSC and FTM. Don't wait for the end of the month to withdraw your funds, I should've withdrew my fund on Christmas. Thank you Captain Hindsight how does this help me?

  It's important that we learn from our mistakes, that we take the time to understand why we made them. I shouldn't have ignored the caution I should've had as the contagion was spreading on CeFi platforms. I should've gotten out of dodge when I could. Oh and when you have 3 months of your salary tied in your crypto powder maybe just maybe take every precaution possible to protect your capital from address poisoning. Double check triple check that the address you are inputting is actually your address. I lost sleep thinking how I could've messed up the transaction so badly, I didn't blame Binance or Midas. I would consider myself an intermediate to advance user I never botched a transaction before but here I am. But putting on my tin foil hat; Midas was supported by Binance and the collapse of the platform I saw for myself the outflows of liquidity to binance hot wallets. Maybe it was the perfect storm with no protection on Midas' side with whitelisted withdrawal addresses and a lack of caution of an overconfident user that he wouldn't even check to confirm his address.

  Days later when I had lost all hope and was about to tell off Midas support staff what I really thought unhinged. They told me 'your funds are there please go check'. I checked and I double check my address and successfully withdrew my funds. Do you know the mental gymnastics I did to positively allow myself to step forward when I thought I had just lost all my powder? With that gut shot I was so unsure of myself that maybe I wasn't competent enough to self-custody. But I am and so are you. Just don't take anything for granted and be careful a centralized blockchain won't always be there to offer you a refund.