Bitcoin Ordinals Hype Draws Meme Token Traders Into Wallet Drain Attack

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Ordinals gave Bitcoin a way for creators to inscribe NFT-like digital media and later meme tokens onto the Bitcoin blockchain, but with substantial growth the same types of scams and exploits flourished. on other platforms. Last week, the Ordinals space saw what is being described by some users as its biggest such attack to date.

On Friday, a new alleged meme token project called ORNG was launched, offering users the ability to mint a fungible BRC-20 token via the Ordinals protocol. It took place on what appeared to some users to be an actual ordinal launch site called Luminex.

But it wasn’t Luminex and the mint apparently wasn’t legit either. It was launched via a counterfeit website called Luminux (note the sneaky vowel change), and soon Twitter users were complaining that their Bitcoin wallets were depleted after believing they had signed a transaction to mint the new meme token.

It’s a familiar story in the world of Ethereum NFTs and token drops, and these wallet drain scams come in a variety of forms. Sometimes it is through a phishing type attack in which a tampered website is created which looks like a genuine official website or marketplace. Other times, these scams spread through a hacked Twitter account of a notable creator or brand.

It’s unclear exactly how much was stolen in the attack, but the wallet linked to the scam took around 2.37 Bitcoins or around $63,000 mostly on Friday, with fewer transactions recorded over the weekend.

Since launching on Friday, the Twitter account linked to the scam has changed its name to try to serve another potential scam, with the same fake Luminux landing page adjusted to promote a new mint token. It is still unclear who was behind the mint scam.

Luminex and Bitcoin wallet creator Xverse were among the companies warning users about the scam and tweeting details on how to avoid falling for similar attempts. A Luminex spokesperson told Decrypt that they notified their community within minutes of the scam being launched.

The story continues

Like similar Ethereum scams that have drained millions of crypto dollars from unsuspecting users, these are often people acting too quickly to take advantage of what they think is an opportunity to make money.

This fear of missing out, or FOMO, often causes crypto and NFT traders to ignore potential red flags. In that case, the growing buzz around Ordinals projects and BRC-20 tokens, including the recent high-profile launch of the OXBT token, may have tripped up overeager hitters.

Scams often ride waves of popular projects, as seen here, the Luminex spokesperson told Decrypt. We always encourage our community to double check URLs and wait for official announcements before joining new projects.

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