My Adventures as a Crypto Bounty Hunter - Dumbest Scammers Edition Part 6

As always I'm happy to share the funny things that I encounter while I'm on my missions as a crypto bounty hunter, I share these events to raise awareness in the community and to hopefully save the next victim.

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The Hustler

While working on behalf of a client, I encountered a scammer who managed to steal 143.72 Ethereum (approximately $230,000).

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My client was extremely cautious; he did not approve any contracts, did not send funds to anyone, blocked every message he received, and did not click on any links. Unfortunately, he connected his wallet to a website that seemed very legitimate at the time. Unbeknownst to him, you could lose access to your wallet through a simple website signature. My client went about his day without thinking much of it, until he discovered that all his Ethereum, USDC, and tokens had been drained. For those unaware, scammers can drain your wallet via a signature, even though they don't gain direct access to your wallet.

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On the blockchain side, I encountered a method of laundering funds that I had rarely seen before. The scammers created a token using the stolen funds and then added a liquidity pair, depositing the stolen funds as liquidity. They received corresponding liquidity tokens, sent them to another wallet, which in turn sent the tokens to yet another wallet, ultimately returning to the original wallet. It's worth noting that each of these steps took an average of 5 days to complete, so I had to exercise a great deal of patience. The scammers repeated this process several times, seemingly for no reason other than to frustrate me, before withdrawing the liquidity from the last token, exchanging it for a stablecoin, and sending it to HUOBI, a popular Asian exchange. The entire process they used to launder funds seemed pointless because the funds always ended up in the same account. If I had simply left them alone and returned 100 days later, I wouldn't have even noticed the effort they put into cleaning the funds.

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Educational note: When you create a token on any blockchain that allows smart contracts, such as Ethereum or Cardano, before anyone can buy or sell it, you need to create a liquidity pair, like QUEASY/USDT if the token was named Queasy. This is typically done on decentralized exchanges like Uniswap. For instance, if you deposit 1 Queasy and 1 USDT into the pair, the contract will use tokens as a form of receipt to track your deposit, which you can later use to withdraw your funds. These tokens are transferable, allowing you to send them anywhere.

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Huobi is commonly used by the Asian market, making arrests extremely unlikely. However, we are working towards freezing the funds and eventually seizing them, as these scammers are major players in the scamming market, in the end some Queasy Justice is always delivered.

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TLTR; I share an encounter I had some some unusual scammers who stole around 144 ether, and launder it via creating tokens on the ethereum chain.

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As always, stay safe and Freak the Scammers.