FTX compensating users who lost $6M to phishing attacks “just this once,” says SBF

3Commas, a level that enables users to physique automated trading bots, announced Oct. 21 that 3 of its customers’ keys were utilized to execute unauthorized trades connected its spouse speech accounts.

An probe revealed that the affected users were phished utilizing fake 3Commas websites, indicating that the keys were stolen extracurricular 3Commas.

Crypto speech FTX’s CEO Sam Bankman-Fried tweeted Oct. 24 that respective different users had besides fallen prey to different phishing attacks that emulated sites similar 3Commas.  While FTX cannot halt miscreants from creating fake sites of different crypto services, arsenic a “ONE TIME THING,” the speech volition compensate users who collectively mislaid $6 million, helium said.

13) But successful this peculiar case, we volition compensate the affected users.

THIS IS A ONE-TIME THING AND WE WILL NOT DO THIS GOING FORWARD.

THIS IS NOT A PRECEDENT.

We volition not making a wont of compensating for uses getting phished by fake versions of different companies!

— SBF (@SBF_FTX) October 23, 2022

Bankman-Fried elaborated that FTX has a squad dedicated to thwarting bogus FTX clones and that the speech has “a immense fig of controls” to forestall fake sites from attacking FTX accounts. He added that portion “it was a batch of work,” the attempts to forestall phishing attacks person been “mostly successful.”

Bankman-Fried pointed retired that phishing “sucks” and is “something we should beryllium warring arsenic an industry,” dissimilar astatine present, wherever each institution has to effort and squash phishing attempts by itself.

In the existent phishing attacks, FTX and different speech users unwittingly provided their API keys to usage the trading services connected the fake platforms, SBF explained. While the methods whitethorn person varied with the antithetic people sites, successful each case, the victims were exploited by “third enactment attackers,” helium wrote.

SBF further suggested asking the scammer to instrumentality 90% of the loot, astir $5.7 million, successful speech for absolution. He added that helium hoped different exchanges, specified arsenic Binance, whose users were affected by the scam, volition besides compensate the victims. But helium repeated his warning, that it is not a “precedent” and successful the future, FTX volition not compensate users who willingly springiness retired accusation successful phishing attacks connected outer sites.

The station FTX compensating users who mislaid $6M to phishing attacks “just this once,” says SBF appeared archetypal connected CryptoSlate.