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Cryptocurrencies don’t have such a good public image, and that may have been made worse by what happened this week. Many YouTube channels have been hijacked to publish crypto price predictions in the hope that many viewers will fall for the scams. According to Ars Technica, many people, especially from the fighting game community, fell for the scam. On the hacked channels, a blockchain payment company called Ripple was spoofed in a live broadcast to trick viewers into paying more money by including a crypto wallet address.<\/p>\n
The hack began with an email. YouTube users received what appeared to be a sponsorship message with a link. By clicking on it, the hackers were able to access the channel. In the video embedded below, Rooflemonger summarizes how he contacted YouTube and got his channel back… but not everyone was successful. (So some are more equal than others…)<\/p>\n
Shyway also fell for this scam and lost his channel for a few days before it was taken down for “trademark” reasons. He didn’t elaborate, but it probably means that Ripple claimed copyright and demanded that YouTube remove the hacked channel. To no avail, Shyway contacted YouTube’s customer service, but his channel has been removed and is probably not an option. His Google account is back, but his YouTube work is gone, and according to the site’s Twitter, it remains deleted for violating community guidelines…<\/p>\n
Shyway also explained this on Twitter. The scammer pretended to be from SteelSeries, and when he clicked on the NDA to read the details, he lost everything in half a minute. This trick bypasses 2FA, or two-factor authentication, but it is not known how this is possible. If this is indeed the case, 2FA may not be secure enough, and something stronger (3FA?) may be needed to ensure that nothing is lost.<\/p>\n
The lesson? Don’t fall for the scammers…<\/p>\n