About $360K worth of Bored Ape NFTs were lost after popular crypto chat app Discord fell victim to a “brief exploit”.
The Bored Ape Yacht Club’s (BAYC) Discord recently suffered a hack on Saturday. The security breach saw the hackers scoop 200 Ethereum (ETH), or $360,000 worth of non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
Bored Ape creator Yuga Labs made the announcement about 11 hours after the theft was first revealed on Twitter. The NFT developers described the attack as a “brief” exploit and also hinted at ongoing in-house investigations. In addition, Yuga Labs provided an email address for people affected by the hack to reach out. The message posted to BAYC’s official Twitter account read:
“Our Discord servers were briefly exploited today. The team caught and addressed it quickly. About 200 ETH worth of NFTs appear to have been impacted. We are still investigating, but if you were impacted, email us at [email protected]”
The Bored Ape Discord attack occurred after project community manager Boris Vagner’s Discord account got compromised. After accessing the account, the hacker posted phishing links on the BAYC’s official Discord channel and that of metaverse project Otherside.
Twitter user NERF herder first reported the breach and theft. At the time, NERF herder said the stolen amount was 145 ETH ($260,000), traceable to four separate wallets.
Yuga Labs Co-Founder Lashes Out at Discord over Security Inadequacies
Yuga Labs’ co-founder Gordon Goner also took to Twitter to criticize Discord. Goner questioned Discord’s protective integrity saying, “Discord isn’t working for web3 communities. We need a better platform that puts security first.”
However, in response to Goner’s criticism, others in the crypto community suggested that the blame for the Discord hack lay with its users instead. For instance, NFTherder countered Goner saying:
“Don’t blame Discord for users getting socially engineered, having DMs open and clicking phishing links. Use the tool correctly first before blaming it.”
In addition, OpenAvatar NFT collection founder and developer Cory.eth also chimed in, suggesting more responsible usage of Discord technology.
Bored Ape Discord Hack Latest of a Recurring NFT-thieving Trend
The Bored Ape Discord hack is the latest in a series of attacks against high-value digital assets. Back in April, the project’s Instagram account also suffered an even worse security breach. At the time, users lost 91 NFTs worth at least $2.8 million. The hackers used a fake airdop plan that compelled wallet connectivity.
In May, American actor and comedian Seth Green also lost four of his highly-priced BAYC NFTs to a phishing attack. Following the attack, Green moved to try and apply some damage control, asking the crypto community to boycott any potential reselling of his NFTs. In addition, the US actor also stated that he was in close collaboration with authorities to try and recover his stolen digital assets.
The recent occurrence is the third time hackers have breached a Yuga Labs account to scoop user funds.
Tolu is a cryptocurrency and blockchain enthusiast based in Lagos. He likes to demystify crypto stories to the bare basics so that anyone anywhere can understand without too much background knowledge.
When he’s not neck-deep in crypto stories, Tolu enjoys music, loves to sing and is an avid movie lover.
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