American investor and owner of the Dallas Mavericks, Mark Cuban, is the latest to suffer a crypto-related hack, losing $870,000 worth of ETH, USDC and MATIC in a recent exploit.
Wazz, a notable blockchain sleuth, first called attention to the development in a series of tweets, having noticed an unusual behavior exhibited by the address tagged “Mark Cuban 2” at 23:00 (UTC) yesterday.
Lmao, did Mark Cuban's wallet just get drained?
Wallet inactive for 160 days and all assets just moved pic.twitter.com/vWnMZFyHB5
— Wazz (@WazzCrypto) September 15, 2023
The address had remained dormant for 160 days and just began moving out its assets. The first transaction involved $175K worth of USDC sent to an Ethereum wallet yesterday at 22:55 (UTC). The receiving Ethereum wallet now has the tag “Mark Cuban Hacker.”
After the substantial USDC outflow, subsequent transfers occurred within minutes. The stream of transfers saw the movement of 4,337 ENS, 4,859 USDT, 7,020 RARI, 12,354 MATIC, 338 stETH, 5.29 ETH, 697K RARE, and several other assets.
These transfers occurred within one hour, adding weight to the suspicions of a hack. However, Wazz speculated that his suspicions might have been wrong when he noticed Mark Cuban moved $2 million worth of USDC to a separate address.
Nonetheless, Cuban confirmed the hack in a statement to media outlet DL News, as reported today. Apparently, the billionaire noticed the exploit and managed to take out some of his funds. Chinese reporter Colin Wu noted that he recovered $3 million worth of USDC, sending it to Coinbase.
The address (0x29…dAAc) of Mark Cuban, a well-known American investor and owner of the NBA Dallas Mavericks, was stolen after being idle for 160 days, including 175k USDC, 4.34k USDC, 4.86k USDT, 7.02k RARI, 12.36k MATIC, and 338.21 stETH. , 5.29 ETH, 8.247 WETH, 697.48k RARE,…
— Wu Blockchain (@WuBlockchain) September 16, 2023
Cuban’s address now holds a meager balance of $6,368 as of press time. Meanwhile, the hacker’s wallet boasts $871K worth of several assets, including $188K in ETH and $554K in stETH. The address swapped the $175K worth of USDC to wETH shortly after the exploit.
Possible Cause
Cuban told DL News that he believes the hackers must have been “watching” him as he opened his MetaMask wallet for the first time in a while to see that his account had been compromised.
He admitted that the hack could have resulted from a fake MetaMask application he downloaded. He disclosed, “I’m pretty sure I downloaded a version of MetaMask with some shit in it.” This remark syncs with suspicions within the crypto community.
The exploit is the latest in a series of hacks witnessed within the space over the past few months. As reported by The Crypto Basic on Monday, some investors recently lost almost $700K to a phishing scam leveraging Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin’s hacked X account.
Entities such as Atomic Wallet, CoinEX, and Stake have also suffered high-profile hacks, with losses of $270M in 102 days. Investigations linked these hacks to North Korea’s Lazarus Group.
Disclaimer: This content is informational and should not be considered financial advice. The views expressed in this article may include the author's personal opinions and do not reflect The Crypto Basic’s opinion. Readers are encouraged to do thorough research before making any investment decisions. The Crypto Basic is not responsible for any financial losses.
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