Improving GNN-Based Methods for Scam Detection in Bitcoin Transactions - A Practical Case Study
Bibliographic record
Abstract
The Bitcoin generator scam is one example of existing deceptive schemes enticing users with promises of free or effortless Bitcoin generation. These scams predominantly exploit individuals unfamiliar with cryptocurrency seeking low-effort avenues to obtain Bitcoin without financial investment. In this paper, we propose and analyze methods to improve the performance of Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) in detecting fraudulent cases within Bitcoin transactional data. We explore multiple GNN variants, alongside various graph sampling methodologies. To overcome the shortcomings of these sampling methods, we propose a new sampling method BFRON—a hybrid approach mixing Breadth-First Search and Frontier Sampling. Additionally, we introduce an enhanced optimization pipeline and a new metric to improve fraudulent node detection. Evaluation metrics, including Instance Information Gain and Group Distance Ratio, are employed to analyze the challenges of over-smoothing in Graph Neural Networks and the efficacy of diverse graph sampling techniques. Our results show that overall BFRON is the best solution and RGGCN is the best-performing GNN. Moreover, we show that our enhanced pipeline and the usage of graph normalization have important advantages.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.004 | 0.016 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".