NFT artist Beeple’s Twitter account was hacked with a phishing scam, and people lost thousands of dollars

Andrew Marquardt
·2 min read

The Twitter account of one of the most successful NFT artists was hacked on Sunday, and people lost thousands of dollars in crypto because of it.

Mike Winklemann, the digital artist and graphic designer known as Beeple, was hacked on Sunday by a scammer who posted two tweets from his account. The first tweet promoted an exclusive NFT drop with Louis Vuitton and the second announced that Beeple would release a set of exclusive NFTs for free, according to Crypto Daily.

Neither post was real, and Twitter users who clicked on the links featured in the scammers’ tweets automatically had one Ethereum drained from their crypto wallets. An estimated $71,000 in crypto was stolen from users’ accounts, Crypto Daily reported.

Winklemann regained access to his account within a few hours of the hack, which he announced in a series of tweets.

https://twitter.com/beeple/status/1528380635081068544

“Stay safe out there, anything too good to be true IS A F******G SCAM,” Winklemann tweeted after regaining his account. “And as side note, there will never be a SURPRISE MINT I mention one time in one place starting at 6am Sunday morning.”

Many users replied to the Winklemann’s tweet sharing their experiences after clicking on the scammers’ links.

“My only blue chip NFT was stolen this morning to this scam. I had the misfortune of bad timing- saw the tweet about 30 seconds after it posted and thought it was just the sort of crazy random charitable thing you might do to change random people's lives. Tough, valuable lesson,” tweeted one user.

Others wondered whether Winklemann would do anything to help users who lost funds in the phishing scam.

“Any chance you can return the ETH to the wallets that have been scammed? Would be a nice gesture from an artist as wealthy as yourself. How were the victims supposed to know it was a scam raffle if [it] is posted from your verified twitter account?” another user tweeted in response to Winklemann.

https://twitter.com/GreenwickJimmy/status/1528389554704719872

Winklemann did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com