TON-based wallet drainer shuts down, eyes Bitcoin
2024-10-07

A wallet drainer for The Open Network (TON) announced that it is shutting down its services and directing users to a different crypto-draining service. 
On Oct. 7, Web3 anti-scam solution Scam Sniffer shared a screenshot of a TON-based wallet drainer announcing its shutdown. The wallet drainer claimed that there are not enough crypto whales in the community, which is bad for its business. The hackers wrote: 
The wallet drainer directed its users to drain Bitcoin BTCUSD instead. In the announcement, the hackers said that if their users “enjoyed draining” on TON, they would also “love” draining BTC. 
The drainer also advertised a different service and said its TON-based drainer would not return. 
Drainers started to eye TON in June
In a previous Cointelegraph interview, Blockaid co-founder Raz Niv said they’ve seen more drainers become interested in TON. Niv explained: 
A TON drainer was also detected while baiting users with a fake 5,000 USDt USDTUSD transaction. The scam uses TON’s comment feature, which lets transfers include a custom message, essentially masking the real purpose of signatures. 
Transfer messages show signs like “Receive 5,000 USDT” and a “Confirm” button. When a user signs the transaction, the token drain commences. 
In May, Scam Sniffer said that the trick had already been used to drain 22,000 Toncoin TONUSD tokens, worth over $150,000 at the time. 
Phishing scams drained $46 million in September
Meanwhile, Scam Sniffer data showed that about 10,800 victims were affected by phishing attacks in September and that about $46.6 million in digital assets were lost to phishing last month. Most of the losses came from one phishing transaction draining over $32 million in crypto. 
Phishing attacks trick crypto holders into linking their wallets to fraudulent services like drainers. This allows the malicious actors to withdraw their victim’s funds without further authentication.