'Monkey Drainer' scammer stole $1 million worth of cryptocurrencies via phishing in 24 hours

Phishing scams have always been a pain in the digital space. Now the industry has moved into the cryptocurrency world as well.

Various cryptocurrency news outlets reported Thursday, citing a self-proclaimed crypto investigator on social media under the pseudonym ZackXBT, a known "Monkey Drainer" scammer who stole about 700 ETH in the past 24 hours.

There are two wallets in the case that end in 0x02a and 0x626. But these are not the scammer's addresses. These addresses were the two most prominent victims of the scam, losing more than $370,000 in total.

Another victim reportedly lost 1 NFT from the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) collection and 1 NFT from the CloneX collection, and a dozen other NFTs totaling about $150,000. The grabbers did not leave the stablecoins unnoticed; 36,000 USDC was successfully withdrawn from the victims' wallets.

According to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, phishing is a type of Internet scam that targets consumers by sending them an email that looks like a letter from a reputable organization, such as an Internet service provider (ISP), financial institution, or even a tax payment agency.

As the scammers also like to call it, it's a social engineering technique. Typically, such emails ask for the recipient's personal information. The FTC says that information is then used to open new accounts or gain access to the consumer's current accounts.

So it's always a good idea to call back and contact the company "on whose behalf" you're getting these strange letters. Also, knowing your IP address, the fraudsters may send the so-called "comet" (in IT slang), asking for an update of your browser. It will look natural because it appears in the browser, not on some random site. This gizmo may download malware, but this rarely happens because it's challenging to find out the ip of a person not associated with the victim.

To protect yourself from phishing attacks, it is enough to check information or companies on behalf of which the fraudsters act or google "updates." You will save yourself from possible money loss and confidential information leakage.