As a seasoned cybersecurity researcher with years of experience battling digital adversaries, I can confidently say that the world of crypto is no stranger to innovative schemes devised by scammers. In my line of work, I’ve seen it all – from the naive to the downright cunning. The recent trend of posting seed phrases for loaded wallets online is a testament to the ever-evolving nature of these scams.
In a deceitful tactic, scammers disguise themselves as unsuspecting cryptocurrency users and share their seed phrases publicly on the internet for wallets containing valuable digital assets. This trick is designed to steal crypto from those attempting to take advantage of these accounts.
Cybersecurity expert Mikhail Sytnik from Kaspersky noted in a recent blog post on December 23rd, scammers have devised a fresh strategy: they’re posting cryptocurrency wallet seed phrases as comments on YouTube using newly created accounts.
The researcher found comments in finance-related videos from users asking how to transfer Tether (USDT) from a crypto wallet to another wallet, which shared a seed phrase.
Sytnik noticed a digital wallet holding approximately 8,000 USDT on the Tron blockchain, which appeared to be an enticement. A potential thief looking to take the USDT would initially need to transfer a minimal amount of TRON (the Tron network’s native token, TRX) to that bait wallet as payment for transaction fees.
Whenever an attempted thief moves TRX into the decoy wallet for transaction fees, those TRX are swiftly redirected to another wallet managed by the swindlers, because the decoy wallet is actually a multi-signature wallet – it needs several confirmations before any outgoing transactions can be processed.
According to Sytnik, for any transactions to be made from these wallets, consent from two or more individuals is necessary. Therefore, sending USDT to a personal wallet isn’t an option, not even after the ‘fee’ has been paid.
“In this scenario, the scammers are something like digital Robin Hoods, as the scheme primarily targets other crooked individuals.”
The researcher advised people never to try to access other people’s crypto wallets, even if given the seed phrase, and to be wary of online strangers’ claims about cryptocurrency.
Scammers looking to scam other scammers is nothing new in crypto.
In July, Kaspersky uncovered a complex fraud aimed at money-hungry individuals, using Telegram to lure them with links to genuine cryptocurrency exchanges. The scam also featured seemingly harmless files, which were actually hidden traps that could be exploited.
This elaborate scam intended to surreptitiously plant malicious software, with the ultimate goal of possibly seizing a vast amount of data and resources from the user’s computer.
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2024-12-24 08:26