In a bold demonstration of digital acrobats, crypto-focused venture capital firm Blockchain Capital fell victim to an elaborate phishing scam when its official Twitter account was hijacked by hackers. The mischief-makers created the illusion of a token giveaway, a token christened “BCAP,” to dupe the unsuspecting public. Methodically, they constructed a sham website, a grotesque mirror image of the Blockchain Capital site save for an extra ‘n’ in the URL.
Creating an allure of exclusivity and urgency, the fraudsters declared their faux giveaway only valid for a day — an excellent stoke to fan the flames of the Fear Of Missing Out (FOMO) that tends to flood the crypto community. A rather crafty move was to suppress the comments within these posts, thus inhibiting the possibility of being flagged as a scam.
Alerted by some ethical blockchain devotees and quick-thinking users, the ordeal ended with Blockchain Capital repossessing their Twitter account and erasing the deceptive posts. But the tale serves as a captivating reminder of how these virtual landscapes can morph into warzones with renegades searching for naive prey.
The jig bears striking resemblance to a warning issued by the FBI about an uprising of scams in the crypto and NFT space, where scoundrels disguised as NFT developers pilfer social media accounts and spread information about fictitious NFT releases. Ominously, these offenders employ ‘drainer smart contracts’ to empty crypto wallets once victims have connected to the fake sites.
Indeed, the Blockchain Capital incident didn’t pioneer such feats — back in April, a brazen violation allowed cyber bandits to breach popular trading platform KuCoin’s Twitter account to propagate a similar fraudulent giveaway activity. The fiasco resulted in a heart-breaking crypto loss of more than $22.6K. Following this misadventure, KuCoin came forward to compensate the victims and reassured its wide user base of the safety of their assets on the platform.
These events stir up a whirlpool of perceived safety within the crypto sphere. Yes, exchanging and investing in crypto assets can yield wealth, but there’s no denying the presence of concealed predators, threatening to slam apart the still fragile trust in the crypto market. As this technology continues its unwavering march towards becoming mainstream, the need for robust cyber security solutions is paramount.
Source: Cryptonews
