Scammers have found a new way to outsmart even their fellow crypto thieves, using a sophisticated wallet setup to deceive would-be criminals into losing small amounts of tokens.
A recent scam making waves on YouTube is reportedly tricking crypto enthusiasts into falling victim to their own greed. According to a security update from Kaspersky, the scam preys on individuals who are looking to steal crypto but instead end up becoming the victims themselves.
Kaspersky highlighted an example of a comment where a thief asks, “I have USDT stored in my wallet, and I have the seed phrase. How do I transfer my funds to another wallet?” This question was a cleverly designed trap. The wallet in question contained over $8,000 worth of stablecoins on the Tron blockchain, and the seed phrase was part of the scammer’s bait.
The scam targets would-be thieves, as the wallet was set up as a multi-signature wallet. Such wallets require multiple approvals to authorize any transaction, so when the scammers tried to steal the funds by sending Tron’s TRX tokens to the wallet, the tokens mysteriously vanished into another wallet controlled by the scammer.
The real trick here is that the multi-signature setup made it impossible for the scammers to withdraw the funds to their personal wallets. Instead, any tokens sent to the wallet were diverted elsewhere. Kaspersky noted, “The scammers are impersonating crypto beginners who naively share their wallet access, luring equally unsuspecting thieves who then become the victims.”
This scam is not an isolated incident. Similar baited comments are appearing across the internet, with new accounts repeatedly offering the same seed phrases in an attempt to ensnare potential thieves.
While the scam may not be targeting large sums of money, as gas fees across most blockchains are typically under $10, the operation is clearly aimed at those who believe they can outsmart others in the crypto space. In the world of crypto crime, it seems there’s always an opportunity to make a profit—even if it’s at the expense of fellow fraudsters.
