To capitalize on a recent real partnership between Beeple and the luxury fashion company, links to a phony Louis Vuitton non-fungible token (NFT) lottery were shared.
Mike Winkelmann, better known as Beeple, is a digital artist and popular non-fungible token (NFT) developer. He had his Twitter account hacked on Sunday, May 22 as part of a phishing scam.
Capitalizing the Recent Collaboration
Users warned about Beeple’s tweets at the time by Harry Denley, a security analyst at MetaMask. It included a link to a Louis Vuitton NFT cooperation raffle. It was, however, a phishing scam that, if clicked, would drain cryptocurrency from consumers’ wallets.
Moreover, the con artists were most likely attempting to profit off a legitimate recent collaboration between Beeple and Louis Vuitton. Beeple produced 30 NFTs for the premium fashion brand’s “Louis The App” mobile game in May, which used as player incentives.
The fraudster continues to post phishing links to bogus Beeple collections via Beeple’s Twitter account. It enticed naïve customers by promising a free mint in exchange for unique NFTs.
Additionally, Beeple’s Twitter had the phishing URLs up for almost five hours. According to an on-chain investigation of one of the scammers’ wallets, the first phishing link netted them 36 Ethereum (ETH), which valued around $73,000 at the time.
The scammers made roughly $365,000 in ETH and NFTs from high-value collections via the second connection. Mutant Ape Yacht Club, VeeFriends, and Otherdeeds added to the businesses targeted, bringing the total worth of the fraud to roughly $438,000.
According to on-chain data, the fraudster sold the NFTs on OpenSea and then transferred their stolen ETH into a crypto mixer to try to hide their winnings.
Beeple later claimed ownership of his account on Twitter. “Anything too good to be true IS A F*CKING SCAM,” he continued, reminding his followers.
A Target for Hacks
Beeple obligates for three of the top 10 most expensive NFTs ever sold. This includes one that sold for $69.3 million, the most expensive single-owner property ever sold. Because of his fame, he has been a target for hackers.
On the other hand, an admin account on Beeple’s Discord hijacked in November 2021. They also advertised a similar phony NFT dump, which cost customers roughly 38 ETH.
Scammers are trying to cash in on the NFT buzz, according to a research released earlier this month by cybersecurity firm Malwarebytes. Their most popular approach, according to the business, is to exploit bogus websites that appear to be reputable platforms.
