Crypto Foundations
This track is the minimum viable mental model for crypto usage. It is designed for users who need enough clarity to use wallets, read networks, and understand why onchain actions behave differently from Web2 transactions.
These are the habits the track should leave behind. If they are not changing how you read prompts, routes, and confirmation screens, the track is not doing its job yet.
What actually happened
These are public cases and repeated real-world patterns turned into teachable stories. Use them to see how small shortcuts become expensive outcomes in real product flows.
FTX showed the balance, but custody controlled the failure
The FTX collapse is still the clearest beginner lesson in custody confusion. The platform displayed customer balances and felt like the home of the assets, but the entity behind the interface had misused customer deposits and owed customers $8.7 billion, according to the bankruptcy team's 2023 report.
One real-world failure usually teaches faster than ten abstract warnings.
If the balance is visible inside a major platform, the platform is probably functioning like a safe account provider.
The user learns to trust what the interface displays without first understanding who holds the keys, controls withdrawals, or absorbs failure when the operator breaks.
These are the exact product moments where this kind of mistake usually first looks harmless.
Custody is not back-office trivia. It defines who carries the failure when the friendly interface stops protecting you.
Use custody as a first-principles check. Before you size up deposits or trust the balance as 'yours', ask who actually controls keys, withdrawals, and recovery.
Approval phishing works because signing feels routine
Chainalysis reported in July 2024 that losses tied to approval phishing had grown to more than $2.7 billion since May 2021. The attack pattern is simple: trick the user into signing or approving something that quietly gives a malicious address spending power later.
One real-world failure usually teaches faster than ten abstract warnings.
If no funds move immediately and the prompt looks like an ordinary wallet step, the action is probably harmless.
A familiar wallet or app frame creates comfort while the real permission being granted remains poorly understood by the user.
These are the exact product moments where this kind of mistake usually first looks harmless.
The beginner defense is simple but strict: do not normalize permissions you cannot explain.
Treat signatures and approvals as decision points. If you cannot explain what the contract can do after the prompt is confirmed, do not continue.
Before you sign or confirm
This section should help in the moment of risk. Keep one question in mind: what should I check right now before giving authority or sending the route forward?
Before first serious use
Decision flow
Do not use this like a reading section. Use it as the order of operations when the screen is asking for authority or final confirmation.
How to think through it
Read the authority first
Begin with the thing the wallet or route is asking you to authorize. If that is still blurry, every other detail is secondary.
Anchor the route to chain and counterparties
Identify the execution environment and the main trust targets before you let the visual flow carry you forward.
Separate quote, approval, and confirmation
One user journey can contain several decisions. Treat each one separately so a smooth UI does not blend them into one reflex.
Signals to notice
That usually means the authority layer is the real unresolved part of the route.
That means the trade story is ahead of the execution model, which is exactly how beginner mistakes survive into confirmation.
Interface comfort is not evidence. It is often the thing hiding missing understanding.
After this track
Once the core lesson is clear, use these paths to widen the mental model or go deeper where the concept matters most.