In our latest instalment of ‘who’s been scammed,’ crypto security firm PeckShield has reported that a whale lost $24 million worth of Ethereum in a phishing scam on September 6th.
The Ethereum in question was being staked on liquidity staking provider Rocket Pool, with the unfortunate victim losing their entire Lido Staked ETH (stETH) and Rocket Pool ETH (rETH) fortunes.
The combined 14,430 ETH-derived tokens were taken in two swift transactions (which relate to each respective token), with the 9,579 stETH tokens equating to $15.5 million, and the 4,851 rETH tokens equating to around $8.5 million (at the time of taking).
#PeckShieldAlert A whale fell victim to a #phishing attack, losing $24.24M worth of cryptos, including ~4,851 $rETH and 9,579.2 $stETH.
— PeckShieldAlert (@PeckShieldAlert) September 7, 2023
The phisher has already swapped these $rETH and $stETH for ~13,785 $ETH and 1.64M $DAI.
A portion of the $DAI (~451K $DAI) has already been… pic.twitter.com/3jPTJWeqw4
Per PeckShield, the culprit quickly swapped the tokens for 13,785 ETH and 1.64 million Dai (DAI). The majority of the latter was then sent to an account on cryptocurrency exchange FixedFloat, with the remaining funds going to three separate crypto addresses.
To actually get hold of the funds, the scammer used allowance/access permissions, which are ERC-20 smart contract features that enable third parties to gain spending power over coins held by someone else. In practice, it took shape through the victim offering token approvals to the scammer by signing an “Increase Allowance” option.
Intuitively, some Ethereum community members are against this specific feature of the ERC-20 token, as it opens the door for illicit activities to take place… as shown in this exact circumstance.
This crypto scam instalment comes just days after Australian betting casino ’Stake’ saw its Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain (BNB) and Polygon (MATIC) wallets drained for a collective $41 million. Further, the worryingly frequent nature of these attacks is a firm reminder to stay safe when navigating across Web3 platforms and crypto transactions, especially when visiting unfamiliar sites.
Want More Cutting-Edge Crypto News?
Follow Us: X TikTok Instagram Telegram LinkedIn
Sign up to our newsletter at the bottom of the page
Check Out Our Top 10 Crypto Currencies of 2023
This article is intended for educational purposes and is not financial advice.
