Crypto Phishing Scams Continue to Plague Social Media Platform

According to CryptoPotato, a significant number of individuals have fallen victim to crypto phishing scams on a popular social media platform, formerly known as Twitter. Scam Sniffer's February Phishing Report revealed that deceptive comments from impersonated accounts were used to lure unsuspecting users to phishing websites, resulting in 57,000 victims and collective losses of around $47 million. This marks a 75% decrease in the number of victims compared to the previous month. Ethereum mainnet accounts for the majority of thefts, comprising 78% of the total, with ERC20 tokens being the primary assets targeted, making up 86% of the stolen funds. Phishing signatures like Permit, IncreaseAllowance, and Uniswap Permit2 facilitated the thefts of ERC20 tokens. Wallet Drainers have also begun utilizing Safe or Account Abstraction wallets as token approval spenders, further exacerbating the phishing issue. These findings are consistent with SlowMist's investigation, which uncovered widespread theft driven by phishing tweets. Despite Elon Musk's promises to curb bots on the platform, cybercriminals continue to exploit advertisements to promote websites that result in crypto drainers, fake airdrops, and other scams. In 2023, the platform's revenue dropped by 22% compared to the previous year, reaching $3.4 billion, primarily due to a significant decrease in advertising income over the last two years. Efforts to increase revenue from subscriptions and data licensing have not compensated for this loss.