With constant news of hacks / frauds, there are my ways to protect oneself.

I believe one of the biggest problems cryptos is facing is fraud and hacks, be it in the forms of coins or exchanges (Mt. Gox, Bitgrail, Bitconnect, NiceHash, etc).

There are few ways to protect yourself. These are the rules I try to follow...

• After signing up to a new exchange. Try the exchange a few times before sending a huge amount. Try these features of the exchange with small amount of deposit, withdrawal, trading, etc. It is better to gain 0% then losing 100%. Reputed exchanges are Coinbase and Binance.

• Avoid keeping huge capital in exchanges. As far as I know, no exchanges have protection / insurance in case of hack or loss. As no government / regulations are in place, its YOUR responsibility to protect your investments.

• Always verify the website address before using your credentials. A good practice is bookmarking the page and always login following the bookmark.

• Setup wallets for coins you are hodling. Transfer them from exchange to your personal wallet as soon as you think the fee is reasonable enough. Usually 1% - 3% of the value of the coin. Exodus wallet supports multiple coins, it makes life easier.

• Cross check address and the SYMBOL each time you send coins. A quick way to verify is checking the first and last few digits of the address.

• Give as little KYC documents as possible.

• Research coins before investing in them. Check the website. Read whitepaper and any other documentation. Check the charts. Check the team. Check their Reddit and social media involvement. Watch videos by multiple channels. Check the Roadmap, find out how much they achieved from launch date. Try their platform if available.
  Once you have learned enough about the coin, setup your goals. Ask yourself, do you believe in the technology? How long are you willing to hold? How much of your portfolio are you ready to invest in it? The standard practice is not more then 5% - 10% of total value of your portfolio.

• For long term holdings, revisit your coins montly / bi-weekly. Check their progress. Check if they delivered what they had promised. Ask yourself, has your vision changed towards the coin. If so, make the adjustments. Learn to ignore the FUDs.

• Avoid making emotional decisions. In case you have doubts in your decision, give yourself 10 - 15 mins to calm down. Taking deep breathe usually helps.

• Remember: There is nothing called as free money. If there is smoke, there is definitely fire there. I usually avoid those coins which scream scam. But if you still wanna risk, invest a small amount which you are ready to lose, try to recover the amount as soon as you can. In most cases, I usually forget the $. Eg. I had invested a nominal amount in BitConnect. I had considered it lost the moment I invested in it. Well, BitConnect didn't surprise me.

Referral Links:
Coinbase - https://www.coinbase.com/join/58c4666ad3aea7680a332fa0
Binance - https://www.binance.com/?ref=11065731