Crypto Collapse: Tether Blacklists $20M USDT Transfer Scammer

Crypto Collapse: Zero Transfer Phishing Attack

On Aug. 1, a zero transfer phishing attack resulted in the theft of $20 million worth of Tether (USDT) from a victim address, prompting an immediate freeze by the stablecoin’s issuer Tether.

According to an update from on-chain analytic firm PeckShield, the attacker was able to intercept the 20 million USDT from the victim address 0x4071…9Cbc. The victim had intended to send the funds to 0xa7B4BAC8f0f9692e56750aEFB5f6cB5516E90570; however, the money was sent to a malicious address instead: 0xa7Bf48749D2E4aA29e3209879956b9bAa9E90570.

The scammer had first received $10 million from a Binance account. The victim then sent it to another address, and the scammer used a fake Zero USDT token transfer from the victim’s account to the phishing address. A few hours later, the victim unwittingly sent 20 million USDT to the scammer, thinking they were transferring it to the intended address.

The swiftness of Tether’s response raised questions, but the incident serves as an important reminder of the risks associated with web 3.0 coins, AI fakes, crypto voyagers, crypto terra, crypto predictions 2022, crypto tom brady, crypto podcasts, crypto today youtube, and crypto sites.

The Growing Threat of Zero Transfer Phishing Scams

Zero transfer phishing scams have become a major problem in the crypto space, with multiple instances reported in the past year, including one in December 2022 that resulted in over $40 million in losses. This type of attack involves an attacker sending a transaction for zero tokens from the victim’s wallet to an address that appears similar to one to which the victim has already sent tokens before. As users often only check the first or last five digits of a wallet address, they are tricked into sending their assets to the phishing address.

For example, if the victim sent 100 coins to an exchange deposit address, the attacker might send 0 coins from the victim’s wallet to an address that looks similar. When the victim sees this transaction in their transaction history, they may mistakenly assume that the address displayed is the correct deposit address and send their coins to the phishing address.

Crypto enthusiasts can take a stand against zero transfer phishing scams by collecting this article as an NFT. Doing so will preserve this moment in history and demonstrate support for independent journalism in the crypto space.