- How often
- Never. There is no exception and nothing to weigh up.
- Cost of following it
- None whatsoever.
- What it prevents
- Immediate and total loss of whatever the wallet holds.
- Why people break it
- It arrives wrapped in a plausible process: migration, verification, recovery, proving the wallet is yours.
- If you already did
- Move whatever remains to a new wallet immediately and do nothing else first. This is measured in minutes.
The absolute oneNothing legitimate anywhere ever asks for a wallet phrase or private key, in any framing, for any reason. Not to migrate, not to verify, not to recover, not to prove ownership.
The framings it arrives in
- Migration. The wallet system is changing and yours needs moving.
- Verification. Confirm the wallet belongs to you before a withdrawal clears.
- Recovery. You reported a problem, and this is presented as the fix.
- A support process. Somebody presenting as staff, on a channel that does not exist.
- A form on a page. Sometimes with no human involved at all, which makes it feel procedural rather than personal.
Why the answer has to be flat
Because every version of the request is designed to be reasonable, and assessing reasonableness is what the pressure is aimed at. A rule that says never requires nothing of you in the moment. A rule that says only if it seems legitimate requires exactly the judgement being attacked.
That is also why this entry sits in a section sorted by frequency. Its frequency is zero, which makes it the easiest rule on the site to follow and one of the most valuable.
If it already happened
Move the remaining funds to a new wallet before doing anything else, including before looking at the platform. This is the one item on the whole site where genuine urgency applies, and it applies because something has already gone wrong rather than because somebody is offering you something.