Dec 2021 - Fractal NFT Discord Hack - $150k (Global)
"Fractal is a startup project from Twitch co-founder Justin Kan specializing in the buying and selling of NFTs representing in-game assets. It was announced earlier in December and quickly amassed a following of more than 100,000 users through Discord — making it a target for the kind of scammers that have plagued NFT projects since the beginning."
"Introducing the Fractal NFT." "Last December [2021], we launched Fractal NFT collection, the largest and most successful airdrop on Solana."
"100k unique snowflakes floating around the metaverse. Fractals will come with benefits on the Fractal marketplace and within the community. In addition, it is our hope that fractals will give you special powers in your favorite blockchain-based games. We believe “cross-game” assets like these, that are truly yours, is the future of gaming. Together, we can unlock that future.
Fractals belong to 1 of 4 factions: tri, quad, penta or hexa. The faction dictates what shapes the fractal is constructed from and the color it emits. The tri faction is the largest, containing 70,000 fractals. The hexa faction is the smallest, containing only 1,000."
"Each fractal has a power level from 23 to 100. Higher power fractals are more rare, as they are not easy to find in nature because of their instability. You can quickly determine the power level of a fractal by the fractal’s size and complexity."
"Fractals are dynamic clusters of energy and thus may change slightly over time. Fractals have a variety of attributes, some of which are not visible from the fractal’s image. These include faction, power, name, purity, velocity, spin and altitude. Games may choose to utilize these attributes however they wish. Perhaps your player unlocks special powers when you collect 1 of each faction… Or perhaps fractals with ultra-high purity unlock secret doors. Endless possibilities. Game on frens."
"In the Fractal NFT Metagame, Fractal NFT holders are competing for power. By engaging on Fractal through minting, trading, and most importantly, playing in tournaments, you can power up your Fractal NFTs.
Beware, Fractal NFTs will slowly discharge the newly acquired power. The discharged power will be redistributed to other players to earn. The speed of discharge depends on the purity of your snowflake. The higher the purity, the slower the discharge.
Very soon, you will be able to use Fractal Wallet containing the NFT to unlock in-game benefits with our Metagame partner games.
Keep track of your Fractal NFT Metagame progress by comparing the “OG Power” attribute to the “Power” attribute. "
"Buyers hoping to get a limited-edition NFT from Fractal, a new marketplace for game item NFTs, were given an unpleasant and costly surprise on Tuesday morning when it was revealed that a link sent through the project’s official Discord channel was a scam set up to steal crypto."
"The announcements bot on our @fractalwagmi discord was hacked. Do not go to any url and connect your wallet / mint anything."
"an unauthorized user posted a fake minting link in Fractal's "#announcements" channel."
"Users who followed the link and connected their crypto wallets, expecting to receive an NFT, instead found that their holdings of Solana (SOL) cryptocurrency were emptied and transferred to the scammer’s account. An analysis posted on Medium by Tim Cotten, founder of another NFT gaming project, estimated the value of SOL stolen to be around $150,000."
"Justin Kan, co-founder of Twitch for his Fractal NFT project, where 373 users stole their cryptocurrency."
"The hacker made out with ~800 sol (~$150,000) by managing to post a fake mint link in our #announcements channel. With over 100,000 members in our community, it’s quite impressive that the hacker only managed to dupe .3% of our community."
"In a Twitter video, co-founder Justin Kan encouraged Fractal members to "always be using a burner" for their crypto wallets, and to always be on the lookout for scams like this one.
"The startup said in its announcement that it will fully compensate the victims of the hack"
"Fractal is planning to fully compensate these 373 victims. We will need a few days to work it out. Please be patient with us. To the victims: We already have the list of Solana wallets that sent funds to the hacker and so we do not need anything from you at this moment. Do not delete your wallet, as we have no way to verify who the wallet owners are outside of returning funds to the wallets that were drained."
Further Analysis
Fractal launched a large-scale NFT collection called "Fractals" in December 2021, featuring 100,000 unique snowflake-themed NFTs. These NFTs belong to one of four factions, have power levels ranging from 23 to 100, and possess various attributes. A scam occurred when a hacker infiltrated Fractal's Discord "#announcements" channel and posted a fake minting link. Users who followed the link and connected their wallets were defrauded of their Solana cryptocurrency, amounting to approximately $150,000. Fractal plans to fully compensate the 373 victims affected by the hack and has obtained the list of Solana wallets that sent funds to the hacker.
How Could This Have Been Prevented?
More Cryptocurrency Exchange Hacks/Scams/Frauds
Monkey Kingdom Discord Hack > > < < Monkey Kingdom Additional Minting Hack
Sources/Further Reading
Warning: Hackers Are Targeting Discord Bots to Rob NFT Users (Dec 31)
The NFT Discord Channels are Attacked By Hackers, who seek to gain traction in Cryptocurrency - Game News 24 (Dec 31)
Play Free Games, Win Tournaments, & Redeem Rewards | Fractal (Dec 31)
Index – Fractal (Dec 31)
fractal nft (Dec 31)
https://fractal-team.medium.com/fractal-nft-metagame-1b334e8ba5d9 (Dec 31)
https://solanart.io/collections/fractals (Dec 31)
FRACTAL NFT METAGAME: COMPETE FOR POWER - YouTube (Dec 31)
NFT METAGAME EXPLAINED - YouTube (Dec 31)
A hacker scammed Fractal's Discord and stole $150,000 - Protocol (Dec 31)
Scammers steal $150K worth of crypto from NFT project with Discord hack - The Verge (Dec 31)
Fractal NFT Discord hacked, scammers make off with $149K worth of SOL (Dec 31)
https://fractal-team.medium.com/dear-fractal-community-70173e8a5ea7 (Dec 31)
Fractal NFT Project's Discord Gets Hacked, Crypto Worth $150k Stolen (Dec 31)
Solana NFT Project Fractal Becomes a Victim of Another Nasty Discord Attack (Dec 31)
@justinkan Twitter (Dec 31)
@roshankd90 Twitter (Dec 31)
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