TLDR
A new industry study finds that roughly 62% of crypto press releases come from high?risk or outright scam projects, making crypto PR an unreliable signal of legitimacy.
- Communications firm Chainstory analyzed 2,893 crypto press releases and found over 60% linked to projects classified as high risk or scams, with only about 2% covering genuinely substantive news.
- Crypto press release wires operate as a paid parallel news market, placing unvetted promotional content next to real journalism and occasionally helping fuel price manipulation and fake partnership stories.
- For crypto users, press releases are best treated as marketing; real diligence means checking teams, docs, code and independent coverage rather than trusting as seen on logos or hypey headlines.
Confidence: high because multiple outlets summarize the same Chainstory dataset with consistent figures.
Deep Dive
1. What The Report Actually Found
Chainstory examined 2,893 crypto press releases from June to November 2025 and found that more than 60% came from projects tagged as high risk or scams, according to several summaries of the study, including one noting that over 60% of crypto press releases are linked to high?risk or scam projects.
The breakdown is roughly 35.6% high?risk and 26.9% confirmed scams, with only 27% low?risk and 10% medium?risk issuers. Only about 2% of releases reported substantial events such as funding rounds or mergers; most were routine product tweaks, token promotions or exchange listings.
Chainstory classified risk using red flags like anonymous teams, unrealistic yield or return promises, copy?paste websites and cross?references to scam blacklists and consumer warnings.
2. How Crypto PR Becomes Dangerous
The study describes crypto press release distribution as a parallel news market in which paid press wires publish client content with minimal review, often guaranteeing placement on dozens of sites for a fee, as outlined in a Yahoo Finance writeup on this parallel news market.
Because these releases can appear in news sections with light labeling, readers and even bots may treat them like independent reporting. This has already contributed to incidents such as the fake Walmart Litecoin partnership release, which briefly sent LTC up about 30% before being denied.
The report also highlights keyword bombing where issuers stuff buzzwords like AI, NFT or DeFi into headlines regardless of relevance to hook retail traders and algorithms, a pattern discussed as a keyword bombing tactic.
A flashy press release, especially one blasted across dozens of sites, is often a sign of budget and marketing ambition, not proof that a project is solid or its claims are accurate.
3. How To Read Crypto PR Safely
For users, a practical approach is to treat every press release as marketing first, then ask whether independent, editorial coverage or on?chain fundamentals confirm the story. If not, risk is higher.
Red flags include anonymous or unverifiable teams, guaranteed yields or risk?free language, hypey superlatives and buzzwords with no clear technical or business detail, and links that lead straight to wallets or aggressive calls to deposit.
Regulators increasingly treat PR, AMAs and social posts as evidence when evaluating whether a token sale or platform involved misleading inducements, which means sloppy or promotional messaging can later increase legal risk for teams, as stressed in guidance on responsible PR in Web3.
Visibility on news sites can be a useful early signal of sentiment, but it should prompt extra verification, not substitute for basic checks on team, code, audits and real usage.
Conclusion
The finding that around 62% of crypto press releases are high?risk or scam?linked shows that the PR layer of crypto is heavily skewed toward promotion, not disclosure. For investors and users, the safe posture is to treat paid press distribution as noisy marketing and look for independent verification, on?chain traction and sober communication before letting any PR headline influence risk decisions.
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