$60 million disappears in AnubisDAO project within a day of its launch
A project called AnubisDAO launched a coin called ANKH, and were quickly flooded with cash from investors hoping to find another dog-themed memecoin success like Dogecoin or Shiba Inu. In less than 24 hours, the money vanished from the liquidity pool in what project creators claim was a phishing attack, but more likely was a rug pull. One investor interviewed by CNBC said he had invested nearly $470,000 in the coin before the money was drained.
OpenSea NFT trading platform patches a vulnerability that had allowed hackers to steal from users
Bug bounty hunters helped OpenSea patch a cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in their platform that previously allowed attackers to create an NFT from an SVG image, which contained an iframe that would execute JavaScript. Attackers could create an authorization popup that looks legitimate, and if the victim fell for it, gain access to their wallet. OpenSea quickly patched the vulnerability after disclosure, though it appears it had been used in the wild — the bounty hunters began their research after seeing tweets of users who had fallen victim to attackers using the exploit.
A much-hyped Miss Universe NFT project turns out to be a rugpull
Miss Universe and its models, the @nft Instagram, and Steve Harvey all got in on the advertisements for the Miss Universe NFT project, which Miss Universe presenter Paula Shugart said was "going to be the first brand in the NFT space that is about women, about women's empowerment, and embracing the technology, and moving forward. I love it; this is the first one that is away from other more male-oriented spaces." Buyers were offered signed prints, virtual meetings with the models, exclusive events, and a chance to win $50,000. None of this materialized, the Miss Universe Instagram account was deleted, and NFT owners who asked questions began to be banned from the project's Discord channel.
Rapper Tekashi 6ix9ine releases a series of NFTs, only for the project not to deliver anything it promised
$100,000 to charity, governance power over the project funds, a boxing game, and weekly competitions and raffles were all promised as a part of the Tekashi 6ix9ine-backed Trollz NFT collection. However, the project crumbled shortly after it began, with creators removing the ability to mint new NFTs before the designated number were released, a takeover of a Discord bot funneling prospective buyers to scam links, and the rapper deleting any trace of his affiliation with the project. One buyer lost $40,000; around $4 million in total was poured into the apparent scam.
DeFi platform C.R.E.A.M. is hacked for a third time, this time for $130 million
Crypto lending service C.R.E.A.M. Finance lost $130 million in a flash loan attack. It was the third hack of the platform this year, following a $37.5 million hack in February and an $18.8 million attack in August.
A tech startup aims to solve the real problem with the U.S. justice system: the lack of gambling involved
Tech startup "Ryval", which is formally launching in 2022, announced its plans to allow "everyday Americans" to bet on the outcomes of civil lawsuits, potentially raising funds for the parties. While the company is spinning this as "mak[ing] access to justice more affordable", I have considerably less faith that allowing crypto investors to decide on who and what is worthy of a lawsuit (or at least which lawsuits are likely to be "profitable" to them) will somehow introduce more equality into the American legal system.
"Realms of Ruin", a YA storytelling NFT project, collapses hours after launch
Six popular young-adult fiction writers attempted to launch an NFT project where they created a base universe, and participants would contribute their own stories (which they would mint as NFTs) that would be added to the official storyline if the authors liked them enough. Questions around who would own copyright, how teenagers (the target audience) would obtain cryptocurrency and mint NFTs, and environmental impact led the creators to shutter the project only five hours after the launch announcement went out.
- "Inside the Realms of Ruin", TechCrunch
- "Realms Of Ruin Storytelling NFT Collapses After 5 Hours", GameByte
Successful exploit of the CreatureToadz NFT project briefly nets a poorly-disguised hacker 88 ETH (almost $350,000)
A 17-year-old hacker was able to use a phishing webhook to make himself an admin in the CreatureToadz Discord server. Users who minted NFTs unknowingly sent cash to him, netting him a total of around 88 ETH (almost $350,000). However, after the hacker's real identity was uncovered shortly after the attack, the hacker returned the funds, claiming he'd intended to return it all along.
Hacker steals $16 million from Indexed Finance
A hacker drained $16 million from Indexed Finance, a defi protocol built on the Ethereum blockchain. The stolen funds represented nearly half of the total value locked on the platform. The hacker was later revealed to allegedly be an 18-year-old Canadian named Andy Medjedovic, who continued to refuse to return the funds even when his identity was revealed. The hacker argues that he simply took advantage of an arbitrage opportunity, and swore to "fight to the death" in court over his right to keep the money. However, the hacker never showed up to a December court appearance, and a warrant was issued for his arrest.
Four NFT projects on the Solana blockchain rug-pull in one day
Developers behind Solana Towers, an NFT project allowing investors to buy rooms in a metaverse virtual condo as NFTs, disappeared with around $280,000 a day after the project's launch. It was only one of the projects to do so that day, joining the developers behind three other Solana NFT projects: "Interstellar Bots", "Cheesy Dizzy", and "Technidroids".