Gate.io users at risk as scammers fake giveaway on hacked Twitter account

Hackers took implicit the authoritative Twitter relationship of crypto speech Gate.io, putting implicit 1 cardinal users astatine hazard of losing funds to an ongoing fraudulent Tether (USDT) giveaway.

Social media level Twitter serves arsenic the astir effectual mean to scope the crypto community. As a result, the inclination of hacking into authoritative Twitter handles of verified accounts to beforehand scams is connected the rise.

Hackers of chartless root took implicit Gate.io’s Twitter relationship and changed the website URL from Gate.io to gąte.com (https://xn--gte-ipa.com/) — a fraudulent website impersonating the exchange.

The fake website is actively promoting a fake giveaway of 500,000 USDT portion asking users to link their wallets (such arsenic MetaMask) to assertion the rewards. Once a idiosyncratic connects their wallet to the fake website, the hackers volition summation entree to their existing funds and extremity up draining the assets.

Blockchain researcher Peckshield besides confirmed the ongoing onslaught arsenic it detected the phishing website and alerted users astir the hazard of losing backstage keys.

#PeckShieldAlert #Phishing Seems similar crypto-exchange Gate[.]io's verified Twitter relationship @gate_io was compromised & has been utilized to stock links to fraudulent $USDT GIVEAWAY.
gąte[.]com is the phishing site.
Thanks @aayushrai11 and @grpolice for the intel pic.twitter.com/cpZ6CgAADm

— PeckShieldAlert (@PeckShieldAlert) October 22, 2022

Cointelegraph reached retired to alert officials astir the ongoing hack and is to perceive from Gate.io astir related remediation. At a clip erstwhile crypto scams are acceptable to deed all-time highs, investors are advised to cross-check the website URLs of the trading platforms to guarantee the legitimacy of the offerings.

Related: Mango Market's DAO forum acceptable to o.k. $47M colony with hacker

The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) precocious warned that crypto ATMs are gaining popularity among scammers to person funds from victims.

According to the FBI, ligament transfers, prepaid cards and crypto ATMs are being utilized by scammers to debar being tracked by instrumentality enforcement:

“Many victims study being directed to marque ligament transfers to overseas accounts oregon acquisition ample amounts of prepaid cards. The usage of cryptocurrency and cryptocurrency ATMs is besides an emerging method of payment. Individual losses related to these schemes ranged from tens of thousands to millions of dollars.”

As victims hold to wage up, the scammers inquire victims to wage taxes implicit the archetypal amount, “causing them (investors) to suffer further funds.”