- Many victim accounts encountered fraudulent videos posted by an attacker and eliminated them as soon as they found them on their channels.
- Many big channels associated with cryptocurrency sector, such as The Moon, Ivan on Tech, Floyd Mayweather, and many more, became victims of attack.
- It seems that attackers attained accessibility to Youtube accounts by utilizing SIM swap scam, possibly allowing them to 2FA.
Hackers Preying on Crypto Youtubers Now
Crypto attackers are now targeting prominent crypto Youtubers, some of these accounts got hacked on January 23 during, sometime around afternoon. Videos unauthorized by account owners got posted on their channels by attacker, who tried to manipulate viewers to send money to his wallet.
Accounts that got attacked by hacker involve some prominent accounts such as The Moon, Ivan on Tech, Floyd Mayweather, Box Mining, Altcoin Buzz, BitBoy Crypto, amongst others.
Wallet address associated with Binance Smart Chain mentioned in deceiving video had a total of 11 transactions as this article was being written, showing a balance of 0.08 BNB.
Michael Gu stated to a news agency that Boxmining, his Youtube channel, unauthorizedly posted a video. He added that it was a stroke of luck, they caught this live video under couple of minutes of going live, and eliminated it from channel immediately. Views, as well as comments, already began from members of community as soon as video went live.
Internal assessment was done by Gu, but neither bugs or viruses were identified inside it that would have allowed attackers access to their accounts. The Individual made allegations that Youtube might be accountable for this activity.
A Reddit user recommended that it seems though attackers obtained accessibility towards Youtube accounts utilizing a SIM swap scam, allowing hacker in bypassing two factor authorization or 2FA.
They all posted similar titles, such as “ONE WORLD CURRENCY.” They added an address in fraud video and elaboration regarding sending money to predator wallet to gain a fresh type of currency named OWCY.
However, Youtuber Michael was not satisfied with statement that attack got momentum due to SIM swap, as he hasn’t had any logins on private Google account. As per Gu, he could have lost accessibility to his phone, but nothing like that occurred.
They observed a BRAND account login from Philippines, which is impossible as these accounts are pegged with private accounts. So this was either a rogue worker or an attack from side of Youtube. This is the reason numerous accounts became prey in a single go.
Shashwat Gupta, Altcoin Buzz’s CEO and founder said, there was something faulty around 1 AM when a video was posted without their permission on their channel. He wasn’t sure what happened, and discussions are being made with Youtube for understanding this issue and to steer clear of these breaches.
Richard Heart, another crypto Youtuber posted a Tweet regarding his channel’s ban during a live stream, pointing out that Youtube had knowledge of this occurrence.