NFT Trading Platform Experienced Theft, Millions Of NFT Dollars Lost

The peer-to-peer trading platform NFT Trader experienced a security breach (photo: x @NftTrader)

JAKARTA - The peer-to-peer trading platform NFT Trader experienced a security breach on December 16, allowing hackers to steal millions of dollars worth of nonfungible tokens (NFTs).

NFT Trader confirmed the incident on X (formerly Twitter). They said the attack was aimed at an old smart contract, and prompted users to revoke the delegation to two addresses: 0xc310e760778ecbca4c65b65c9874757a4c4ece0 and 0x13d8faF4A690f5AE52E2DC52938d1167057B9af.

Among the stolen NFTs included at least 13 Mutant Ape Yacht Clubs and 37 Bored Apes, as well as NFTrisedFriends and World of Women, with a loss of nearly US$3 million (Rp46.5 billion), according to Revoke.cash.

The theft was followed by rumors and inaccurate information on social media platforms. In addition, it remains unclear how many hackers exploited security flaws. In a public message, one of the hackers blamed the original exploit on other users. "I came here to take the rest of the trash," they wrote, while asking for ransom payments to return the NFT.

"First of all, as usual, I came here to take the rest of the trash. At first I thought I could only get TOKEN, but finally I found that I could also get NFT. [...] I'm a good person, the value of this NFT is enough for someone to live freely, but I don't care about that. I'd rather take the rest of the trash," said one hacker.

The hacker then claims to have limited technical skills and offers the victim a 10% wage in Ether (ETH) as a ransom for their NFT.

"My technical skills are limited, I can't get all the nft affected at once, and it takes a lot of energy and time. [...] If you want to get back the NFT monkey, then you need to pay me a gift, which I deserve," they wrote.

In another unusual development, one of the victims said that hackers returned a rare NFT along with 31 ETH, worth nearly $70,180 at the time of writing. "And now hackers are only sending me 31 eth? What's going on in this world. Is this real life?" wrote the victim on X.