Former owner of a reportedly stolen Bored Ape files million-dollar lawsuit against OpenSea
Businessman Timothy McKimmy is the former owner of Bored Ape #3475, an NFT he purchased in December for 55 ETH (then about $232,000). In a lawsuit against OpenSea, McKimmy alleged that on February 7, a "security vulnerability allowed an outside party to illegally enter through OpenSea's code and access Plaintiff's NFT wallet, in order to list and sell Plaintiff's Bored Ape at a literal fraction of the value". The Bored Ape was purchased for 0.01 ETH (about $30), then flipped by the alleged thief within hours for 98.9 ETH (a bit over $300,000). McKimmy alleges that OpenSea knew about the reported vulnerability, and failed in their duties to him as a customer by not informing customers of the issue, or shutting down the platform while it was reportedly vulnerable. The lawsuit further argues that because Bored Ape #3475 has a higher "rarity score" than the one supposedly purchased by Justin Bieber for 500 ETH ($1.3M) in January, the value of #3475 is "arguably in the millions of dollars and growing as each day passes". The lawsuit seeks "any and all damages to which [McKimmy] may be entitled, including the return of the Bored Ape, damages equivalent to the valuation of the Bored Ape, and/or monetary damages over $1,000,000."
- McKimmy v. OpenSea on CourtListener
- Etherscan records for the Bored Ape NFT