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Advertisements on the Ethereum blockchain explorer, Etherascan are turning carriers of phishing campaigns trapping the platform users.
Phishing scams are on the rise. Etherscan, the Ethereum blockchain explorer got trapped in the phishing scan as the advertisements over the platform transformed into phishing campaigns. The range of phishing attacks hit over $300 Million stolen from over 324,000 victims in 2023 alone.
Etherscan Ads Fueling Phishing Attacks
On April 8, a tweet from McBiblets, an X Community member disclosed some Etherscan advertising as wallet drainers, alerting the users about the phishing scam.
unreal, some ads on @etherscan are wallet drainers @Plumferno hope you don't mind me stealing your "no clickly"
— McBiblets (@mcbiblets) April 7, 2024
url: hxxps://aps.bifi-yleld[.]xyz/
site links to ipjsonapi[.]com pic.twitter.com/YM667m0fEM
According to the post, the massive phishing campaign is a wallet drainer scam that includes fake websites, encouraging users to hit the link that eventually results in draining all funds. Furthermore, several advertisements over Explorer have been uncovered as phishing campaigns that are mainly designed to trap Etherscan users.
Surprisingly, the advertisements running over the Etherscan were also spotted on a few of the known phishing websites. Additionally, the advertisements have made their way onto some major search engines including Google, Bing, and DuckDuckGo as well as popular social media platforms like X.
Expert’s Reaction To The Attack
Major players in the anti-scam sectors like Scam Sniffer, and SlowMist reacted to the situation.
Scam Sniffer, one of the most popular Web3 anti-scam platforms highlighted the lack of oversight from ads aggregators including Coinzilla and Persona as a key reason behind the situation. The oversight gap permits malicious actors to enter and exploit the software, making it effortless to trap the target audience.
Such advertisements attract individuals to phony websites and ask them to attach crypto wallets to draw funds which are termed “wallet drainer scams”. Once the wallet is linked, the scammers easily withdraw the user’s funds without any need for the user’s authorization and verification.
As per Scam Sniffer data, such types of scams stole around $104 Million worth of assets from approximately 97,000 crypto users at the beginning of 2024. Around $55 Million were recorded for January and $46.8 Million in February.
Additionally, Ethereum holders have lost around $78 Million in assets including ERC20 token and Ethereum (ETH). Furthermore, SlowMist, a blockchain security firm, also highlighted the issue and warned crypto users to stay safe when encountering such scams.
Additionally, an unpopular cyber phishing company Angel Drainer is suspected of leading the phishing attack campaign against Etherscan holders. However, there is no solid evidence of the scammers’ identities.
Steve Anderson is an Australian crypto enthusiast. He is a specialist in management and trading for over 5 years. Steve has worked as a crypto trader, he loves learning about decentralisation, understanding the true potential of the blockchain.
