Bitcoin Forum

Just read through some multiple X handles now that Microstrategy’s X account had been hacked and tweet was done citing the claiming of the $MSTR tokens. As usual the link was a wallet drainer link and around $400k has been lost so far. Currently the tweet seems to have been deleted from the account but it’s deed has already been done.

There is daily continue warning of just clicking links as a bitcoin or cryptocurrency investors but yet many people actually continue fall victim for something I will say as a result of gullibility or greed.

The points from this phishing attack just like others is;

1. Make use of cold wallets; this shouldn’t be put on a second thought.

2. ⁠Do not trust any information from social media even if it is from an influencer account or an official account, verify, verify and verify your information.

3. ⁠If you are to engage on airdrops use a burner wallet at all cost.

Just like what you said here about not trusting information from social media, I think you need to check a reliable source to back up this information you've just given and moreover, you can add up a link for people to access the information.

Edited:

It's really unfortunate, that's the more reason why we need to verify information we see on social media thoroughly and don't be too desperate about any information from influencial people in the society because scammers can easily hack their accounts and defraud a large number of people.
X is becoming a reoccurring platform for scammers to use in defrauding people and this doesn't go down well with it's owner Elon musk.

This is the link to the story OP is talking about, for those who are yet to see or read it:
https://cointelegraph.com/news/microstrategy-x-account-hacked-phishing-scam

---

Gullible people will always fall for things like this, i know it is easier for people to fall for this type of scam because of the account it was posted from, but we have learnt from the past that the accounts of companies and prominent people have been hacked and used to scam quite a lot of people. So do not easily believe all posts about airdrops or giveaway, notwithstanding the account it is coming from.

Having said that, i think these companies and institutions should do better to secure their social media accounts, because it becomes believable when scams like these are posted from their official page. I even think the victims can start a class action against MicroStrategy in this case.

I am disappointed that Microstrategy X account was hacked. Hacking of people X account is common since some years ago and it is now like every week that a well known person X account is hacked. Even it happened to United States SEC early this year that fake bitcoin ETF approval was tweeted by the hacker.

It is simple, this people do not care because the ways to secure your Twitter account is simple. Use 2FA app or security key to secure your wallet and your X account will not be hacked. If you have another device, security key is not necessary and you can just use the 2FA app on another device. This is simple but we will hear soon that another well known person's X account has been hacked.

I can not be a victims of this because I will easily know that the account would have likely be hacked. I do not believe anything good from social media anymore because of how the accounts are often hacked easily.

 This is bad. The hacker didn't just hack into their server, they also made sure to add malicious links leading to a fake Ethereum airdrop and I'm bothered that there's still individuals who would fall the weak trap of clicking on any link they see. Should be attributed to greed or careless? This is the bull season and as such scammers are getting creative and although this one made it look so real, the users should have first done a little research. Shit! I think more users will lose their money if the tech guys at Microstrategy don't figure a way out. You should have dropped a link at least, Op..well here's one.

https://www.google.com/url?q=https://finance.yahoo.com/news/microstrategy-x-account-compromised-posted-051720927.html&sa=U&ved=2ahUKEwiN-urMuciEAxWOaEEAHfwQDOMQFnoECAIQAw&usg=AOvVaw2OO8KcGjoJlKG_rM9yLlKT

Yeah, several articles have published this incident and aside from cointelegraph. Here's with BNN Bloomberg.

Bitcoin-Holder MicroStrategy’s X Account Hacked: Security Firm (https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/bitcoin-holder-microstrategy-s-x-account-hacked-security-firm-1.2039098)

I remember it when the prominent people's Twitter account back then were hacked by a teenager. A lot have been victimized by their greed and not verifying first if the posted thing is for real or not even if the account is from a verified and official person.

They are big player in the industry but somehow got caught by this hacking incident and this determine that no one is safe if they are not careful upon handling their wallets especially upon clicking any links they see online.


Lots of cases where accounts of well known social media personalities got hack and spread something malicious link that can harm those people following them that's why its really better for us to verify on what are we seeing coming from them especially those links they are posting so that we can avoid any potential hacking that might happen to us. But this is Microstrategy they should know more better and avoid those hacking.



Lots of airdrops has been launch recently that's why its important for us to know the risk about participating on that activities so that these hackers will not penetrate and drain our wallets. Burner wallets is recommended so that they cannot take all of our balance if there's something bad happen to us.

Such fraud will exist as long as there are freebie lovers, greedy people for whom the news of any free distribution acts as a red flag for the bull. They are so hasty in the hope of being able to get it quickly that it is useless to talk to them and warn them about caution. Life will teach you regularly; this is how people become smarter if they do not learn from the mistakes of others.

If they use their new and empty wallets to claim, they will not lose money or at least will not lose too much money.

Freebies who want to claim that token simply used their wallets that have considerable cryptocurrencies so the hackers can drain out those wallets and enjoy. This phishing scam can be used as a reminder for people who hunt airdrops too.

Don't use wallets that they store most of money, to join and to claim airdrops.

Thanks for sharing this link, I've read the full details of what happened, and it's indeed very sad how these hackers will maliciously use reputable companies that have gained people's trust to easily manipulate them into clicking phishing sites where the hackers will eventually gain access to their wallets and steal from them.

It has gone beyond only being careful about clicking unfamiliar links, people should also be very careful and shouldn't easily trust when they see any giveaways from reliable and trusted sites, because of the rising cases of them being hacked.

A few days ago, someone I mentored sent me a link to a Bitcoin airdrop site 😂. I couldn't control my laughter. Such a simplistic mindset of people and that's greed pushing them to believe that even when they've been told to avoid such sites promising Bitcoin giveaways when they're not faucets. Sites don't even airdrop established tokens let alone Bitcoin.

How do people not get to trust official accounts again of projects they're following? Again, how do you verify and verify your information once it's a project's official page? One can only become skeptical and scrutinize that much if one has heard of something fishy with such projects. Otherwise, authentic information of projects usually are announced  through their official accounts.

Not just a burner wallet but several of them. It's a safe and cautious way to minimize risk.

Except for a newbie, no one will be seeing this and not think otherwise, we know already that they can hack a social medial account and one of the simplest ways to do identify one is when we are seeing some sort of strange demands on request from the account, if they have any new offers, it will not only be announced on the social media handle alone, they will mail you on that and also uses their other social media platforms in making such announcements, so we shouldn't just rely on a single source for an information, we ca as well make verifications from other means or ends.

Crypto space has a lot of safety measures and sometimes no one can really tell what will happen next seeing most people losing their coins to some sort of scammers. One thing with social media page is they can't be trusted, I consider social media as an open space and definitely if an investor is the type that always want to follow different news on social media then that person is no longer safe. prioritize your privacy first and keep safety measures for example don't always pay attention to different news cause the article I read actually stated why will investors think MicroStrategy will launch an ETH token, very strange because people following the page don't even know the next move. Ignoring such link can help, just imagine those victims used few seconds to skip clicking the link I believe they would never experience such but now they're left with regrets. The most important thing is learning from their mistakes.

Just as you said OP, burner wallet is the way to go for any of these AirDrop or any of the  potential tokens you might want to receive.
Because nobody can be trusted, the internet is wild and full of predators that wouldn't spare you a minute if they get access to your wallet.
There has been a continuous campaign for social media users not to click links they are not familiar with, anybody holding such amount of cryptocurrency worth $400k should know better at least not fall for these scammers.

It's a bit scary that so many people easily fall for the simplest scam if it's performed through a trusted channel. Bitcoin's motto is "don't trust, verify" and the users are supposed to be responsible for their security, yet an average crypto investor just blindly trusts some gurus and is ready to give them their life savings if they promise to make them rich. This is not how things should be. If Satoshi's accounts got hacked, how many people would fall for a similar scam?

Imagine Microstrategy that is Bitcoin-only oriented company posting stuff like that, this just shows how shallow minded and stupid most people are on this social networks.  ::)
All people who sent shitcoins on address that hacker posted just failed basic intelligence test, and I don't feel sorry for them losing coins like that.

Microstrategy just purchased 3000 more Bitcoins, so they don't care much about twitter stuff:
https://cointelegraph.com/news/microstrategy-adds-3k-btc-etfs-surpass-gold

It's so damn easy to throw your digital assets away on the social media platforms, and no amount of warning will stop this, the fault is on Twitter itself, to have twitter account this days seem to be one of the most easy, it's why when a official account on twitter post something you still must have reasons to doubt, because the account might be hacked already.

Twitter CEO is seeing all this, but instead he is believing that the fault is on people, for falling into something that looks almost too real, Twitter is not a safe social media platform, you need to avoid clicking on anything from Twitter.

If you are into airdrops, do not use the same wallet you are using for storing your asset to claim airdrops, use a separate wallet address, people also have some faults on them and this is one of the stupid things they do, airdrops are not safe, they don't deserve to be taken serious, so always use a spare/separate wallet for them.

This is bad news and not an encouraging one for the bitcoin community. An account like that of microstrategy that have a lot of users following and trusting their services shouldn’t be used as bait to get to victims. This was as a result of a hack but the company needs to do more in securing their social media accounts from hackers. The deed has been done but it’s a lesson for those that love anything free in the crypto space which is not suppose to be so, check and verify for credibility sake before clicking on any link you come across if you’re an investor in bitcoin or even a passerby to avoid not falling victim of such fraudulent act.

Although the scamming is not related to Bitcoin we all know that Microstrategy is a well-known big Bitcoin investor. When the US SEC Twitter account was hacked through a SIM swap attack, it became clear that anything could happen on social media. Microstrategy should have been able to set up some security measures such as using Two-factor authentication applications. However, it is a lesson to everyone to always verify any information that emanates even from official channels. And there is also a need to make hasty decisions or be in a rush to invest. Some people will always rush to invest in such attractive projects without doing proper research.

There is no escape about this one, I believe that newbies will keep falling for this and that's why these scammers are getting more encouraged to keep doing this to innocent people, there are many newbies that knows twitter only for crypto related things and they don't know anything about Bitcointalk forum, how are they going to be saved?

The lucky ones will find their way to this forum but many won't, and I don't see many warnings on google about crypto related scams that's pointing directly to twitter as the den of hackers, many newbies will keep falling for it.

Even when they get smarter and learn, there are still millions of people that are yet to be into crypto, and they have no about what's awaiting them in this crypto space, it's such a mess, with scammers taking advantage of people like this, for many, it will be discouraging, the first time experience can never be missed, newbies will always be a victim.

This is exactly where the problem starts, and that’s the reason why most of these influencers accounts are being attacked and hacked: people are too ignorant about things, and whatever they see posted on their influencers official page doesn’t need to be investigated or doubted; rather, they should act as urgently as possible in order to take part in whatever the link promises them.
 
Sometimes the kind of link that these scammers or hackers use to promote something is something that, in a normal sense, the original account owner won't share on his or her page, but greed and ignorance always make those newbies fall prey to such scams.

I regret it when I see that a noteable social media account has been hacked and a lot of money has been stolen from followers. Though this responsibility goes to the owner, they ignore it. A few follower blindly believed them, and that's how they ended up with a big loss. I admit that due to greedy behaviour, we have always been losing funds. So we should be able to detect something between a hack and something real. We should be able to identify suspicious things on social media. We have to cross-check if the shared data is real. We can check their other social media and websites. But due to greed and laziness, we don't do it. As a result, we become victims. So we must be very careful and learn a lot of things to save our funds. 

Most of these things that happen, I would say typically is an insider job, basically people that manage those Twitter accounts and in the end, what would you expect they tell you? It was hacked. Therefore, despite those accounts being a target for scammers and hackers to hack, and back to your point, it's critical that these prominent companies hire experts who are security cautious when it comes to matters about their social media because of this kind of thing, knowing that high percentage number of people would tend to believe whatsoever information that spilled out of their Twitter handle as being legit information, and before you know it in situations like this, many would fall victim.

I agree that companies should focus on keeping their social media accounts safe. Recent events where important Twitter accounts were hacked show how important it is to have security experts in charge. When big companies and famous people use social media people trust the information they share. So it's very important to protect these accounts well to stop unauthorized people from getting in and spreading lies or bad things. By using strong security rules and hiring smart experts companies can keep their online accounts safe and protect their followers from scams or wrong information.

There would always be victims for a story to be complete and am not surprised that there would be those that would fall victim to this sort of strategy. It could even get worst still when a few persons where reward to use them as bait into luring more users to the system by sharing links and testimonials.

The few that might be saved from this are those who are ignorant of it and those who aren’t into anything free.
Experience in the cryptospace teaches you skepticism and how not to let the drive to clicking just any link get the better measure of you.

Also, having all your wallet or a large holding on an electronic or internet enabled device isn’t always the best way to survive in this industry. When your holdings have grown to a substantial amount, it’s a green to get a hardware wallet and ensure safety of your Bitcoin.

Verify in what? there's no needed to verify in this case.

The scam happen because the X account gets hacked and the scammer posted the phishing sites, do you think if the scammer post the real sites, it's not a scam? there's a chance if the scammer hacked the Microstrategy's sites too!

We had a similar case before, bitcoin.org is a trusted site, but it doesn't mean everything in this sites is 100% trusted. SCAM ALERT!! BITCOIN.ORG website Hacked and Offering Double return. (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5361408.0)

It's like saying that, who would dare hack elon musk account? As if elon musk isn't human himself, people need a lot to learn actually, the principles of keeping your crypto safe is to avoid tempting offers online, even if its from elon musk, when it's too good to be true you need to stay away, at least have some doubt and see what happen to those who jumped in right away.

After crypto wallets have warned you to never share your recovery seed with anyone, you believe that elon musk or any popular figure have the right to ask for your recovery seed, and that's not a scam? People are not just using their head is all, be you or anybody, no one has the right to ask for your recovery seed.

Assuming that you are using Trezor hardware wallet and one day you get a message from the team that they need your recovery seed for anything possible, will you still give them? Because it's from the official team? How can you even verify that it's the real team? Even if it's the real team, the rules was to never share your key, but people are sometimes very stupid.

I wonder how these hackers and exploiters manage to hack into the accounts of these firms and organizations. Don't they have enough security for their accounts? Having a very strong password should be enough to keep these hackers away unless the managers of their accounts are also becoming victims of phishing where they click certain links or run apps or stuff that have malware injected in them, and if that is the case, they need to do something for it.

When it comes to people losing money, people need to understand that no rich person, be it an influencer, a celebrity, a content creator, or anyone in general, would ever come to social media and post a link to give money to their followers, they don't do it, so if you see something like that, understand that it's a trap.