Targeted Phishing Scam Gets $438,000 in Crypto and NFTs From Hacked Beeple Accounts

Digital artist and popular NFT creator Mike Winkelmann, better known as Beeple, had his Twitter account hacked on Sunday, May 22, as part of a phishing scam.

MetaMask security analyst Harry Denley reminded users that Beeple’s tweet at the time, which contained a link to a Louis Vuitton NFT collaboration sweepstakes, was actually a phishing scam that, if clicked, would drain cryptocurrency from users’ wallets.

Scammers may be hoping to take advantage of a recent real collaboration between Beeple and Louis Vuitton. In early May, Beeple designed 30 NFTs for the luxury fashion brand’s “Louis The Game” mobile game, which are embedded as rewards for players.

Scammers continue to post phishing links from Beeple’s Twitter account, leading to fake Beeple collectibles, luring unsuspecting users with the promise of free minting of unique NFTs.

The phishing links persisted on Beeple's Twitter for about five hours, and on-chain analysis of one of the scammers' wallets revealed that the first phishing link brought them 36 Ethereum (ETH), worth about 73,000 at the time. Dollar.

The second link netted the scammers about $365,000 worth of ETH and NFTs from high-value collectibles like Mutant Ape Yacht Club, VeeFriends, and Otherdeeds, bringing the total value stolen from the scam to about $438,000.

On-chain data shows that scammers are selling NFTs on OpenSea and putting their stolen ETH into crypto mixers in an attempt to launder money.

Beeple later tweeted that he had regained control of his account, adding to remind his followers that "anything too good to be true is a fucking hoax."

Beeple created three of the top ten most expensive NFTs ever sold, including one that sold for $69.3 million, the most expensive NFT ever sold to a single owner. That attention made him a target for hackers.

In November 2021, an admin account on Beeple's Discord was hacked by scammers, where a similar fake NFT was advertised, causing users to lose around 38 ETH.

Earlier this month, cybersecurity firm Malwarebytes published a report highlighting an increase in phishing attempts as scammers try to cash in on the NFT hype. The company noted that using fraudulent websites described as legitimate platforms is the most common tactic used by scammers.