Phishing Scheme Tricks Investor Out of $2.5 Million: New Scammer Tactic
Date: 2025-05-27 Author: Henry Casey Categories: BUSINESS
The cryptocurrency community has once again been hit by a sophisticated phishing attack, which resulted in losses of $2.5 million. The incident occurred under a scenario known as a “zero transfer” - a trick in which scammers send a transaction with a zero amount to the victim. Such an operation appears in the wallet history, giving the user the impression that the address is safe and has been used before.
This trick works because many users, when checking the transaction history, copy the addresses, believing them to be verified. However, in reality, this may be a trap: the attacker uses an address that is very similar to the real one. This is what happened in the described incident, recorded by Cyvers.
The victim, not noticing the substitution, first transferred 843,000 USDT to a fraudulent address. Three hours later, she sent another 1.75 million USDT to the same address, unaware that both transfers went to the same scammer. Thus, the total amount of lost funds was about 2.6 million USDT.
Cyvers analysts emphasize that such schemes are becoming increasingly popular. According to data collected for the period from July 2022 to June 2024, over 270 million "zero" transactions were recorded on the Ethereum and BNB Chain blockchains. Of this number, about 6,000 led to real thefts, with total user losses amounting to more than $83 million.
Phishing attacks continue to evolve, and scammers are finding new ways to deceive. Recently, users of the Gemini cryptocurrency exchange faced another threat - they received letters claiming that the platform had allegedly gone bankrupt. The messages contained links supposedly aimed at “protecting funds,” but in reality they led to phishing sites designed to steal personal information and access wallets.
Experts strongly recommend that cryptocurrency users remain vigilant: carefully check the recipients' addresses, avoid clicking on suspicious links, and do not trust information from unverified sources, especially if it concerns financial transactions.
