- Top-up address scams pilfer the wallet history in the form of lookalike addresses.
- Users lost 880K including the latest 130K stolen through a fraudulent wallet.
- Stop scams by checking addresses and avoiding using history parade.
A wave of poisoning address scams affected crypto wallets severely, with almost $880,000 stolen in the recent attacks. The most recent victim was deprived of 30.14 ETH, equivalent to approximately 130,000 dollars after they transferred funds to the wallet address that was nearly similar.
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This follows prior losses worth $880K caused by consellers who capitalized on the victims’ business activity history.
How Scams Like Poisoning Address Steal Your Crypto Millions
The scams in poisoning addresses make the users fall victim by compromising their wallet history. The scammers initiate small payments at addresses that will be almost similar to the real address of the victim. Even current wallets and blockchain explorers tend to only show the first and last characters of an address and therefore make near identical lookalikes difficult to identify.
Attackers generate thousands of these addresses, ensuring the start and end characters are the same. When a list of transactions that an individual has engaged in contains the poisoned address, users can easily copy and paste the address, clicking to send crypto to the scammer, thinking it is a contact that they recognize or a wallet that belongs to them.
Source – X
This strategy was responsible for the egregious loss of 880K where four individual transfers of 220K each were sent to dummy lookalike wallets once victims believed that their legit transfers were stalled.
The main factor contributing to the success of scammers is the rush and irresponsibility of users in transfers. Because a number of users simply copy/paste the address off a recent activity page, there is a higher chance that they accidentally transfer funds to a poisoned address.
According to Metamask and other wallet providers, you should not copy the transaction history of your wallet addresses. By placing regular addresses into a whitelist or personal address book, one can help avoid contacting unconfirmed addresses.
Behind the Scenes: Massive $68 Million and $130K Losses Reveal Scam Scale
This newest loss of 130K is against the backdrop of the reported loss of one victim who lost the equivalent of 68 million dollars of Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) in the same type of scam. Such huge theft revealed the extent of the replica poisoning attacks that included more than 80,000 sapphire wallets set by scammers to lure victims .
Attackers launder assets stolen by consolidating funds and sending them through a series of intermediary wallets, then exiting at intermediary exchanges. This laundering helps evade detection. The reason it poses a greater risk in an ever-changing crypto world is that the scams capitalize on everyday user habits. It is important to stay alert when it comes to address validation for every wallet owner.
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