Tips on Spotting Fake and Junk Torrents

[workerbee]

A handy guide to spotting fake or junk torrents was published way back in 2007 on TorrentFreak: https://torrentfreak.com/stop-downloadin...ts-071204/ (thanks to Spud17 for the reference)

Always remember that any torrent that asks you to download or install something, or that asks for your TPB login info, is most definitely fake.

Please feel free to add your own tips here.

[Sid]

The single biggest thing you can do to protect yourself is don't download anything uploaded less than 24 hours ago. Better yet, 48 hours. Give the mods, and the fools who rush in, a chance to find and flag/delete the crap first.

Added bonus 1: if the seeder has any problems that also gives them time to sort them out before they impact you.

Added bonus 2, particularly with popular content: the seed/leech ratio will be much better after a day or two so your download will complete much faster.

[plhbg.sprby]

Anything from anyone posted in archives or any other forms of hiding should be handled with extra caution.

For advanced users set the client to download the first and last piece first so you can look into the contents of the archive as early as possible.

[Philidor]

Stick with torrents seeded by Trusted Uploaders and Verified Uploaders. The folks who get these are typically trustworthy--or at least, more trustworthy than somebody who just walked in and started uploading.

Use sites such as www.virustotal.com/ to check executables for viruses. That will usually require some study to see what the results are saying, but the aggregate conclusions drawn from dozens of virus checkers are well worth learning to interpret.

[RobertX]

That's not to say that a new uploader is completely untrustworthy.

You see, trust is earned, and we are start out the same.