In a significant crypto heist, an unknown individual has reportedly lost access to a staggering $24 million worth of crypto from their Ethereum wallet.
The incident, believed to be the result of a phishing scam, stands as one of the largest individual crypto thefts to date, crypto news outlet The Block reported on Thursday.
The stolen assets included 4,851 Rocket Pool ETH (rETH), worth some $8.5 million, and 9,579 Lido Staked ETH (stETH), amounting to around $15.6 million based on current prices.
The victim’s digital wealth was drained from the Ethereum wallet in a swift manner, which shows just how targeted and professional crypto-focused phishing scammers have become.
IT security firms such as Beosin and BlockSec have analyzed the incident and have pointed towards phishing tactics as the likely modus operandi.
According to these experts, the victim appears to have fallen for a phishing scheme that led them to unwittingly authorize malicious transactions from an Ethereum wallet.
Phishing scams common in crypto
Phishing attacks typically involve deceptive emails, texts or phone calls where victims are tricked into giving away sensitive information.
These types of attacks are among the most common ways people lose funds to malicious actors in the crypto world.
In this specific case, interaction by the victim with a malicious smart contract resulted in the unauthorized transfer of crypto to the attacker.
Shortly after unwittingly giving the green light to transfer funds to the attacker, the stolen digital assets were moved to an address cryptically labeled “Fake_Phishing186943,” as confirmed by data on the Ethereum blockchain explorer Etherscan.
“There are reports that this address was used in a Phishing scam. Please exercise caution when interacting with it,” Etherscan writes about the specific address in a warning to users.
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