What happened
MalwareTips published an investigation today into hashnet.ai, a one-page site selling what it calls 'Liquid Hashrate', Bitcoin mining power a buyer supposedly owns, earns from and can resell. MalwareTips says the page shows no price, contract or withdrawal rule and its Start Mining button leads only to a sign-in screen. It reports that Austria's Financial Market Authority (FMA) published a warning on October 29, 2026 naming Hashnet Infrastructure LLC (Dubai) and Wealthier Corporation Limited (Hong Kong), listing hashnet.ai and support@hashnet.ai, and stating that neither has authorisation to distribute the HashNet product in Austria, where it counts as an alternative investment fund. MalwareTips notes the FMA warning is not a finding of fraud. It found the domain was registered on February 14, 2026 through Namecheap with the owner hidden by a privacy service, yet the site claims $300M+ capital deployed and 9,400+ BTC mined; by MalwareTips' arithmetic 9,400 BTC is about 21 days of all new Bitcoin worldwide and the site's yield figure exceeds the real rate roughly 8,000 times. Its Terms of Service never mention hashrate, hardware, Bitcoin, withdrawals or returns. MalwareTips could not verify what buyers receive after signing in or whether withdrawals work, and advises not to buy HashNet.
How the scam works
Mining and 'hashrate' investment pitches often promise returns from equipment or computing power that the customer never controls. MalwareTips notes that Austria's Financial Market Authority (FMA) published a warning on 29 October 2026 that names hashnet.ai, and that the domain and a support mailbox on the same domain were part of its review published on 11 November 2026. An FMA warning is a regulatory alert, not a criminal conviction.
Do not send money, crypto or identity documents to a mining platform just because the site looks technical. Check the firm against the FMA and any other regulator that covers you, and treat a support address on the same new domain as part of the offer, not as independent customer service.
Source
MalwareTips investigation, 11 November 2026: https://malwaretips.com/blogs/hashnet-ai-scam-or-legit/
