OnChain Fog - A Blockchain and Cryptocurrency Knowledge Platform
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Crypto from zero, in plain English
Wallet Safety
Choose and use wallets without slip-ups
Seed & Keys
Guard your lifeline — lose it and it's gone
Asset Security
Approvals, backups and theft prevention
Avoid Scams
Spot the common scam playbooks
Mindset & FOMO
Beat greed, fear and FOMO
Myths
Debunking beginners' biggest misconceptions
People
Stories and lessons from key figures
Exchange Safety
Choosing, withdrawing, and platform risk
Risk Management
Sizing, stops, and not going all-in
Industry Events
Major events and the lessons behind them
Glossary
Crypto terms in plain English
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View all →Crypto Charity Donations: What to Watch For — A 2026 Practical Guide
Donating crypto sounds modern, but the workflow hides plenty of traps. This guide walks through process, tax, charity vetting, and privacy at a level you can actually execute on.
What Is Cryptocurrency? Explained for Someone Who Has Never Touched It
Assume you have never bought or used crypto and only heard about it in the news. This article uses everyday analogies to answer the basic question — what is it, why does it exist, what can it do, and where are the risks.
What Is an NFT? A Plain-Language Guide for Complete Beginners
NFTs are more than profile-picture art. This guide starts from what "unique" actually means on-chain, then walks through ownership, real use cases, and risks for someone with zero prior Web3 experience.
Wallet Safety
View all →Is a Multisig Wallet Really Bulletproof, or Are There Situations Where It Fails?
Multisig is often treated as the last line of defense for serious crypto holdings, but it is not invincible. A walk through the real-world ways multisig setups fail, from signer churn to module misconfiguration.
Mobile Wallet or Browser Wallet: Which One Is Actually Safer?
A side-by-side look at mobile wallets and browser-extension wallets, comparing attack surface, signing habits, isolation, and the cost of cleanup when something goes wrong.
Why Does My Wallet Keep Failing to Connect to a dApp? A Segment-by-Segment Way to Find the Stuck Step
You tap Connect Wallet and nothing happens, scan a QR and your wallet stays silent, or get kicked the moment you switch networks. These look like one symptom but they sit at very different points in the chain. This piece walks the path segment by segment.
Seed & Keys
View all →Can Someone Else Keep My Seed Phrase for Me? What Actually Happens When You Hand It to Family or Friends
Writing your seed phrase on paper and slipping it to your mom, or sending the photo to your closest friend — the "I won't lose it myself" instinct trades one risk for another. This piece walks through what happens by relationship type.
Seed Phrase Passphrase Explained: When to Use the '25th Word' and When Not To
A passphrase — the so-called "25th word" — is an extra secret layered on top of your seed phrase. Here's what it actually does, what it can't do, what it costs, and who should and shouldn't turn it on.
What Exactly Is the BIP39 Seed Phrase Standard?
BIP39 = a fixed 2048-word list plus a deterministic derivation procedure. Understand it and you'll see why wallets so often interoperate — and which hidden assumptions that "compatibility" really depends on.
Asset Security
View all →After a Drainer Empties Your Wallet, Is There Any Path to Recovery?
Once you discover a drainer has emptied your wallet, what you can do in the next hour is limited, but the order matters. This post lays out the recovery paths along a timeline: on-chain tracing, platform freeze requests, formal reporting, mixer realities, and longer-term recovery.
How to Turn "Revoking Token Approvals" into a Quarterly Routine?
Revoking past token approvals is a low-cost, high-return wallet safety move, but most people only do it once after hearing someone got drained. This post turns it into a fixed quarterly procedure: tools, sequence, gas tactics, and how to handle edge cases.
The Five Signature Phishing Patterns of 2026, and How to Spot Each at a Glance
Signature phishing in 2026 is no longer just "fake login pages." Its core is tricking you into signing an off-chain blob you cannot read, which authorizes someone else to move your assets. This post breaks down the five most common signature phishing patterns today and how to recognize each at a glance.
Avoid Scams
View all →January 2026 Crypto Phishing Cost $311M: How Did the Money Actually Leave?
In January 2026, crypto users lost roughly $311M to phishing — one of the highest single-month totals in two years, according to CertiK and other security firms. How exactly did the money leave wallets? Which categories did most of the damage? This walks through the breakdown.
What Does the Safe Labs 5,000-Address Drainer Report Tell Us?
Early in 2026, Safe Labs published a report mapping roughly 5,000 coordinated drainer wallet addresses. What does that number actually mean, and is there really an army of attackers behind it? This post unpacks the report and discusses how an ordinary holder should adjust their defenses.
Fake Trading Bot Scams: Lazarus's New GitHub Playbook
Cloning what looks like a normal open-source "trading bot" on GitHub and running it is often already the moment you got phished. This piece breaks apart the developer-targeted Lazarus playbook and lists what to do.
Mindset & FOMO
View all →AI Is Siphoning Crypto Money — Should You Chase the Rotation?
Early June showed a clear flow: money rotating from crypto into AI. Nvidia at a new high, BTC and ETH softer. "Is crypto past its prime" surfaced again. This piece does not pick a winner. It answers how mindset should behave during sector siphon.
ETH Slipped Below 2,000 — How Should the Believers Recalibrate?
ETH crossed below the 2,000 psychological line in early June while on-chain activity softened. For self-described "ETH believers," this is a subtler mindset test than the 2022 bear: not one obvious red candle but a slow grind lower.
BTC Broke Below 67k — Should You Buy the Dip? A June Mindset Check
BTC sliced through 67k in early June and briefly tested 61k intraday. The dip-buying itch is back. This piece does not call the next candle. It asks one question: at this level, what rules should your mindset follow before you click buy.
Myths
View all →Why Nine Out of Ten 'Insider Tips' Are Traps
"I have insider info" is the cheapest and most common opening line in crypto. Strip away the packaging and the real structure is almost never sharing — it's a carefully designed exit-liquidity funnel.
Does BlackRock Actually 'Buy' Your Bitcoin?
"BlackRock is buying BTC" gets repeated everywhere, but the mechanism behind that sentence is far stranger than the slogan. This piece pulls apart ETF creation, market making, and actual coin purchases.
Is Crypto Just a Pyramid Scheme? Let's Talk About That Claim Properly
"Crypto is just a Ponzi" is used by both critics and warning-givers — but they don't mean the same thing. This piece unpacks the strict definition, which crypto things look like Ponzi, which actually are, and why the claim is neither fully right nor fully wrong.
People
View all →Is Satoshi Nakamoto Actually One Person? Re-Reading the Decade-Long Mystery From a Few Clues
Is Satoshi one person or a group's pseudonym? Over a decade later, no verdict — but a pile of clues to assemble. This piece walks through writing style, time zone, technical stack, and mailing-list archives, and weighs the "single person" and "team" views.
Who Is Brian Armstrong? The Story of Coinbase's Founder
From the first line of code written in a 2012 garage to ringing the Nasdaq opening bell, Brian Armstrong and Coinbase are the clearest case study of the "compliance-first" path in crypto.
Who Is Roger Ver? The Story Behind Bitcoin Cash (BCH)
Early on he was called "Bitcoin Jesus." Years later he became the loudest voice behind the Bitcoin Cash fork. Roger Ver's path is a window into the early cultural split inside Bitcoin.
Exchange Safety
View all →Why Is Storing Crypto Long-Term on an Exchange So Risky? Lessons Before the Next Blow-Up
Leaving coins on an exchange is convenient and looks normal. But "long-term" on an exchange is a thing that has blown up repeatedly in this industry. This article lays out why it remains unsafe.
How to Read an Exchange's Proof of Reserves (POR)?
What is POR? Why does everyone talk about it after FTX? What can it prove, and what can it not prove? This article peels back the layers of exchange reserve proofs so you can read this "trust artifact" for what it really is.
Is P2P Trading on an Exchange Safe? What to Watch For
P2P trading adds one extra variable to a normal crypto buy: a real stranger on the other side. This piece unpacks the actual flow, the common scams (cancel-the-order tricks, fake payment screenshots, third-party payment disputes), and a practical risk-reduction routine.
Risk Management
View all →How Much Money Is Reasonable to Invest in Crypto? Back It Out From Your Own Budget
"How much should I put in crypto?" has no fixed answer, but it has a reverse-derivation method you can apply to your own life. This piece walks through it across emergency reserves, debt, income volatility, and psychological tolerance.
How Much Crypto Should You Invest? Setting Position Sizes and Loss Limits
More than "what to buy," "how much" decides whether you survive in crypto. This article uses a plain approach to help you set your position size and loss limits clearly.
How to Actually Set a Stop Loss: Three Methods and One Hard Rule
A stop loss isn't "how much pain I can stand before selling." It's a rule you write before the trade and never edit during the trade. Here are three working methods, where each fits, and the details that ruin people.
Industry Events
View all →BTC ETFs Bled for 10 Straight Days, $2.97B Out — What It Means for Ordinary Users
Through June 4, US spot Bitcoin ETFs posted ten consecutive sessions of net outflows totaling about $2.97B — one of the longest negative streaks since launch. This piece breaks down what the number says and, just as important, what it does not.
How Long Is the Lido Unstake Queue, and What Are the Risks?
Lido's stETH is the largest liquid staking receipt on the market. But the moment you click "unstake," you finally meet the queue, the discount, and a handful of details few people warn you about.
What Just Happened: A Bankless Co-Founder Liquidated His ETH
In May 2026, Bankless co-founder David Hoffman publicly announced he'd sold his entire personal ETH stack, sending shockwaves through the community. This piece walks through what he said, the reasons he gave, the market reaction, and what long-term holders should actually take away.
Glossary
View all →Gas, Slippage, TVL — What Do These Words Actually Mean? A Quick Jargon Explainer
First time inside a crypto group or a DeFi app, you get flooded by abbreviations and slang. This article picks the most common terms and explains them by "where you meet it, what it means, why it matters."
What Is Layer 2? An Explanation for Complete Beginners
Using a "main road vs side road" analogy to explain what Layer 2 is, why it's needed, and the common types, written for someone who has never seen the term, with a one-line summary of how the main chain and L2 divide labor.
What Is a Blockchain Oracle? A Plain-Language Introduction
How does an on-chain contract know what ETH is worth right now? This piece walks through what an "oracle" is, why blockchains need one, the difference between centralized and decentralized oracles, and why so many DeFi incidents trace back to this layer.