Crypto YouTubers fall victim to hacking and scamming attempt

Hackers attacked a variety of well-liked crypto YouTuber accounts in some unspecified time in the future through the afternoon of Jan. 23. The accounts posted unauthorized movies with textual content directing viewers to ship cash to the hacker’s pockets.

Accounts who seem to have been focused by the assault embrace: ‘BitBoy Crypto’, ‘Altcoin Buzz’, ‘Field Mining’, ‘Floyd Mayweather’, ‘Ivan on Tech’, and ‘The Moon’ amongst others.

BREAKING: Dozens of Crypto YouTubers have had their accounts hijacked by hackers selling a faux crypto giveaway rip-off. Hacked accounts embrace:@IvanOnTech@boxmining@aantonop@themooncarl@Bitboy_Crypto@mmcrypto@Altcoinbuzzio@FloydMayweather@crypto_banter@CoinMarketCap pic.twitter.com/ykXkZUh9cO

— Mr. Whale (@CryptoWhale) January 23, 2022

The Binance Sensible Chain pockets address that was listed on the fraudulent movies solely had a complete of 9 transactions in BNB on the time of writing, with a complete worth of round $850.

Michael Gu informed Cointelegraph that his YouTube channel Boxmining posted a video with out his permission. “Fortunately we caught it inside two minutes of the video going dwell and managed to delete it,” he stated. “By that point there have been already views and feedback from my group.”

He added that he had finished an inside sweep and located no viruses or bugs that will have given the hackers entry to his account. “Looks like YouTube may be accountable,” he stated.

Many Crypto Youtubers (together with me) bought hacked at present – all publishing a rip-off video at across the identical time – @IvanOnTech @aantonop @Bitboy_Crypto @Altcoinbuzzio @FloydMayweather @crypto_banter @CoinMarketCap
I’ve 2FA enabled. pic.twitter.com/c8z5qmJ3bT

— Boxmining (@boxmining) January 23, 2022

One Reddit post by person “9Oh8m8” recommended that it seems as if the hackers had been in a position to acquire entry to the accounts utilizing a SIM swap scam, which might have enabled them to bypass two-factor authentication (2FA). They added:

“They’re all posting with a title like “ONE WORLD CRYPTOCURRENCY”. They’ve an deal with in vid and outline to ship your USDT/USDC/BNB/ETH to obtain a brand new crypto referred to as OWCY.”

Nevertheless, Gu wasn’t satisfied that the hack was a results of a SIM swap, telling Cointelegraph that there have been no logins on his private Google account. “If it was a SIM swap I might lose entry to my cellphone and so on and that didn’t occur,” he stated.

“What we seen was on the BRAND account (which doesn’t have a login. YouTube model accounts are linked to private) there was a login from the Philippines. Very doubtless that is both a hack on YouTube facet or a rogue worker. That’s how they bought so many individuals on the identical time.”

Founder and CEO of the Altcoin Buzz YouTube channel Shash Gupta added that they seen one thing was amiss at round 1 AM Singapore time on Sunday evening when an unauthorized video was posted to their channel.

“It’s fairly unclear what occurred. I’m speaking to Youtube to get to know the matter and keep away from such additional breaches.”

Associated: YouTube channels hacked and rebranded for livestreaming crypto scams

One other crypto YouTuber Richard Coronary heart tweeted at 9:30PM UTC that his channel had been banned through the center of a livestream, indicating that YouTube was in all probability conscious of the occasion.

Hiya once more @YouTubecreators My channel was simply banned in the midst of a livestream. I believe it may need to do with all the different youtubers that had been hacked on the identical time at present. May you test please, thanks! @YouTube @YouTube

— Richard Coronary heart PulseX.com! Known as the Bitcoin high! (@RichardHeartWin) January 23, 2022

Cointelegraph reached out to YouTube and a variety of different crypto content material creators who had been affected by the hack however had not acquired any further info on the time of writing.