1 year ago
Grave allegations of engagement successful pump and dump schemes are gathering steam against the erstwhile caput of OpenSea Ventures, Kevin Pawlak.
According to NFT Ethics, a non-fungible token (NFT) related investigative quality relationship connected X, Pawlak has masterminded oregon been progressive successful “various precise dubious concern dealings” arsenic good arsenic pump and dump schemes. NFT Ethics claims that Pawlak allegedly perpetrated the fraudulent activities done his pseudonymous individuality “@0xSisyphus“ and “0xMagellan.”
The grounds against Pawlak unearthed past month
NFT Ethics archetypal made the allegations against Pawlak past month. At the time, it concluded aft an investigation that Pawlak was the proprietor of the X relationship @0xSisyphus. The X-based quality transmission concluded aft comparing the transactions and corresponding clip stamps of pawlak.eth and sisyphus.eth addresses.
Blockchain information indicates that an Ethereum code starting with “0xBB5B” registered domains similar kevinpawlak.eth, pavvlak.eth, pawlak.eth, and kevinpawlak.eth connected October 4, 2021.
The NFT Ethics probe revealed that some addresses—pawlak.eth and sisyphus.eth—minted Zorbs tokens wrong a infinitesimal of each other, and sismo.eth DAO tokens wrong 10 minutes of each other.
With screenshots comparing the activities of the 2 addresses successful question, NFT Ethics wrote:
“…the pursuing timestamps perfectly lucifer up, and fixed the precise constricted enactment of pawlak.eth, we person present accounted for astir of their actions that are perfectly successful enactment with sisyphus.eth.”
NFT Ethics aboriginal added that respective anonymous sources person confirmed that Pawlak is so the idiosyncratic down the relationship Sisyphus. The quality transmission besides claimed that Pawlak had a “dubious role” successful the $60 cardinal AnubisDAO rugpull successful October 2021 and had a manus successful a “Rollbit shill.”
An alternate mentation to Anubis Rugpull
In a station 10 days aft the archetypal allegations, NFT Ethics posted a thread alleging that the Anubis incidental was a “premeditated rug” by Sisyphus and that the stolen funds were being laundered done PEPE tokens.
According to NFT Ethics, Pawlak, nether his pseudonym, allegedly “hyped” the Anubis task connected Discord a time earlier the rugpull, which was recorded by a user. Pawlak claimed to person invested $420,000 successful the task and vowed to put much the adjacent day. At the time, the funds of the Anubis task rested successful the hands of Ethan Cheung, a 19-year-old.
When the task was rugged the adjacent day, Cheung claimed to person received an email from Sisyphus containing a malicious PDF record that compromised his instrumentality and wallet. According to NFT Ethics, Cheung’s mentation of the communicative has been corroborated by respective individuals. Sisyphus, however, released a blog station allegedly “framing” Cheung for the rug pull.
NFT Ethics concluded that Sisyphus apt orchestrated the Anubis rug propulsion with a co-conspirator and added:
“The relation of Pawlak, Zim & Co. successful the $60m Anubis rug & different PnD schemes is deserving of acold much scrutiny. They person the intellectual/technical quality to orchestrate specified “hacks” and we anticipation for a heavy probe into the origins of each their crypto/FIAT funds/purchases.”
More grounds revealed
In a follow-up station connected Oct. 5, NFT Ethics shared screenshots of chat logs from the Anubis squad dated 27-29 October 2021. From the chats, NFT Ethics concluded that Sisyphus was the “brain” down the Anubis project, who was successful complaint of approving everything from the wording of X posts to each method and fiscal decisions.
NFT Ethics added:
“He conveniently falsified his relation successful his timeline arsenic “Sisyphus to grip nationalist look and helping propulsion DAO members together”, but helium is the 1 successful complaint & calling the shots.”
NFT Ethics added further screenshots to allege that Sisyphus masterminded the Anubis rug propulsion and framed Cheung to instrumentality the fall.
In their latest post, which was reposted by blockchain analytics level Lookonchain, NFT Ethics noted:
“We refrained from posting these earlier, but the magnitude of soundlessness connected this taxable is deafening. Because helium is well-connected, not galore radical situation to talk retired astir this fraudulent web of people.”
Lookonchain has besides independently verified that the transaction clip stamps connected the 2 addresses, pawlak.eth and sisyphus.eth, sync together. The level added:
“The #OpenSea enforcement is 1 of the largest PnD (Pump and Dump) successful the tract and is progressive successful marketplace manipulation and scams. If this were true, that would beryllium terrible.”
The allegations against Pawlak person been confirmed by a writer astatine The Block, Tim Copeland, who said helium confirmed Sisyphus’ individuality via undisclosed sources.
It is worthy noting that erstwhile OpenSea merchandise manager Nate Chastain was convicted of fraud and wealth laundering successful an insider trading lawsuit successful May 2023. Chastain was sentenced to 3 months successful situation successful August.
CryptoSlate reached retired to OpenSea for remark and a spokeperson from OpenSea provided the pursuing statement:
“Kevin is simply a erstwhile worker who near the institution successful June of 2023. He had a constricted scope portion astatine OpenSea- wherever helium worked successful a non-management position. We person nary consciousness of his engagement with the projects successful question. Furthermore, we person nary transportation to, oregon accusation about, the projects successful question, arsenic they took spot earlier his clip astatine OpenSea.”
The station Allegations of moving pump and dump schemes aboveground against erstwhile caput of OpenSea Ventures appeared archetypal connected CryptoSlate.
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