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Asked to get a banana, a BAYC owner narrowly avoids a fake Forbes scam

November 27, 2023 Coin Telegraph

BAYC

Scammers posing as Forbes journalists have been targeting BAYC holders to set up interviews and distract them while they attempt to steal their apes.

A Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) owner says he has managed to avoid a potentially “dreadful day” after being asked to retrieve a banana for a photo from someone they initially believed was interviewing them for Forbes.

On Nov. 27, NFT collector ‘Crumz’ detailed his run-in with a scammer posing as a Forbes journalist.

He reported that someone pretending to be Robert LaFanco — a real Forbes editor, contacted him by direct message from an impersonator account with the offer of an interview for a new article about BAYCs.

SCAM ALERT!!
I just spent the last 2hours on Zoom with '@Forbes' it was pretty sophisticated and well thought out because I'm usually on high alert but luckily I wasn't caught. Here's what they did. 1/8
— Crumz (@crumz10) November 26, 2023

During the interview, the scammer prompted Crumz to click a "button" to allow access to record the interview. Crumz said he complied with the so-called journalists despite certain red flags, including their use of a non-premium Zoom account and wanting to use a separate recorder bot to record his screen.

“I had to press a button to allow access to record,” he said before adding, “I didn’t think much of it first but at the end, he asks me to say something that resembles my ape and he suggests a banana.”

'Crumz' said he later realized this was a distraction attempt to take him away from his computer during which the attacker would take control of his computer to steal his assets.

‘Crumz’ said instead of getting the banana, he waited by his computer and sure enough, the scammers started to control his screen.

"I mute my screen and there's no video and just waited by the screen and sure enough they started to control my screen, I stopped them when they went on delegate.cash."

8/8
Hopefully I'm safe now. Don't think they can still control my computer when I turn it back on.
Please be safe out there, it could've been a dreadful day today
— Crumz (@crumz10) November 26, 2023

Crypto casino Rollbit partner ‘@3orovik’ echoed the warning to his 140,000 X followers on Nov. 27.

He also fingered a spurious account named ‘Robert LaFranco’ whose profile claims he is a Forbes assistant managing editor. “During this interview, he attempts to trick you to gain access to your PC and steal your expensive NFTs,” he warned.

⚠️ WATCH OUT ⚠️

A fake Forbes journalist is reaching out to BAYC holders for a fake interview

During this interview he attempts to trick you to gain access to your PC and steal your expensive NFTs

It’s very unlikely Forbes would reach out pic.twitter.com/ViYrT0mk1l
— borovik.eth (@3orovik) November 27, 2023

Meanwhile, BAYC community member Laura Rod also reported being contacted by the bogus Forbes editor.

Earlier this month blockchain security firm Slowmist detailed a number of scams in which victims lost crypto assets to fake journalists.

It reported that, after scheduling an interview, the attacker would guide victims to join the interview on Telegram, providing an interview outline, conducting a two-hour interview, and then providing the malicious link to consent to publication.

In October, a Friend.tech user reported being duped by a fake Bloomberg journalist, who lured them into clicking a link for a “consent form” which instead resulted in a drained Friend.tech account.

Meanwhile, several industry observers have noted that scammers on X (Twitter) often have a BAYC profile picture which is something to look out for.

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Nansen phishing emails flood crypto investors’ inboxes

November 24, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

On Sept. 22, one of Nansen’s third-party vendors suffered a security breach, which exposed the email addresses of 7% of the system’s users.

Numerous users of the crypto analytics platform Nansen have received phishing emails from scammers pitching an “exclusive opportunity” to participate in the fictitious “Nansen Airdrop.”

On Nov. 23, crypto community members on X (formerly Twitter) flagged an ongoing phishing campaign targeting Nansen users. The scammers are impersonating Nansen and sending fake invitations to an exclusive airdrop event.

Cointelegraph confirmed the hack from crypto investigator Officer’s Notes (Officercia), who initially warned the community about the ongoing attack. He suspects that user data from a previous third-party database leak is being used to target Nansen users.

On Sept. 22, one of Nansen’s third-party vendors suffered a security breach, which affected nearly 7% of the system’s users. The users affected by the breach reportedly had their email addresses exposed, along with some password hashes, and several had their blockchain addresses compromised. At the time, Nansen claimed it would identify and inform those affected and ask them all to change their passwords. It also clarified that wallet funds were unaffected by the event.

*Nansen phishing email. Source: @offiercia (X)*

The screenshot of the Nansen phishing email shared with Cointelegraph shows the sender was “mail@networkforgood.com,” an email address completely unrelated to the original analytics platform.

It said that for the next 48 hours, users could claim a guaranteed allocated amount of fake NANSEN tokens. The scammers attached a link to the email, which would redirect users to a potentially rigged website.

Officercia advises reporting suspected phishing links to databases such as chainabuse.com, cryptoscamdb.org and phishtank.org, which help the internet community reduce the success rates of such attacks.

Nansen has not responded to Cointelegraph’s request for comment.

Even more crypto investors are potential phishing targets after user data from TrueCoin and FTX bankruptcy claims, among others, was leaked recently.

This is just someone scraping our public API that shows the association between public wallet addresses and public Twitter usernames.

It’s like saying someone hacked you by looking at your public Twitter feed.

Irresponsible reporting from @TheBlock_ and @vishal4c https://t.co/GIXOWazqBk
— friend.tech (@friendtech) August 21, 2023

However, Friend.tech recently denied claims that its database of over 100,000 users was leaked. “It’s like saying someone hacked you by looking at your public Twitter feed,” explained the Friend.tech team, clarifying that the information came from scraping its public API.

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OpenSea NFT users report massive email phishing campaign

November 15, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

OpenSea users have reportedly been targeted with a widespread email phishing campaign, including a fake developer API risk alert and a fake NFT offer.

Users of the major nonfungible token (NFT) marketplace OpenSea have said they are being targeted with a new email phishing attack, and have received emails containing malicious links from attackers posing as the marketplace itself.

According to social media reports, OpenSea users and developers have been targeted by various email phishing campaigns, including a fake developer account risk alert and a fake NFT offer.

One OpenSea developer took to X (formerly Twitter) on Nov. 13 to report receiving a phishing attempt to an email strictly dedicated to their OpenSea Application Programming Interface (API) key. “In other words, dev contacts have been exfiltrated from OpenSea and are the real target in this campaign,” the poster said.

The social media report came in response to OpenSea's insistence that the platform has not been hacked and urging users not to click on links they don’t trust.

Correct- there is no smart contract vuln. But unfortunately for @opensea I just received a phishing attempt, to an email that was strictly dedicated to my OpenSea API key. In other words, dev contacts have been exfiltrated from OpenSea and are the real target in this campaign https://t.co/GD4UgwWIrx pic.twitter.com/rtyUJBMlwl
— Quantity (@quantity) November 13, 2023

Another OpenSea user took to Reddit to express confusion about the ongoing phishing campaign on Nov. 14.

“Haven't used OpenSea for years and all of a sudden, I keep getting emails talking about my NFT listings getting offers,” the poster wrote, adding that all the vulnerable links were trying to direct the reader to install a malicious app.

“Right now I'm getting 3-4 scam/phishing emails a day which is crazy since I got zero just a few weeks ago,” the Redditor wrote, adding:

“So my question is did something new happen to OpenSea. The email address of mine they are hitting is one I created specifically for OpenSea so not concerned but I know OpenSea had hacks previously. Are they just now hitting up my email or is there a new one?”

The news comes a few weeks after one of OpenSea’s third-party vendors experienced a security incident that exposed information related to user API keys. OpenSea reported the breach in a notification email to affected users in late September 2023, stating that user emails and developer API keys may have been leaked due to the attack.

Choose your third party well…
Opensea posted that a vendor was attacked, resulting in the leak of developers' API keys!
Get advice from a professional security consultant about the safety of the third party before choosing. E.g. @SlowMist_Team pic.twitter.com/jcBJ9IaAEN
— 23pds (@IM_23pds) September 23, 2023

OpenSea users have received phishing emails previously. In February 2022, OpenSea officially confirmed that its platform faced a phishing attack from outside the OpenSea website and urged users to stay away from clicking on any links in the emails. The firm was also investigating rumors of an exploit associated with OpenSea-related smart contracts.

OpenSea did not immediately respond to Cointelegraph’s request for comment.

This latest phishing campaign is happening just after OpenSea laid off 50% of its staff, with the stated intention of launching OpenSea 2.0 with a smaller team.

This attack is yet another reminder for the cryptocurrency community to stay vigilant when receiving emails from service providers. To avoid a phishing hack, users should be cautious of the email sender’s authenticity and the associated links. Users should also remember that crypto firms never ask their users for personal data like wallet addresses or private keys.

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