Five Bored Ape NFT thieves have been arrested in Paris in light of recent BAYC scams that lost collectors millions of dollars. The racket involved (at least) five scammers duping BAYC collectors and stealing NFTs worth ~$2.5 million. Crypto detective @ZachXBT tracked down the thieves, and on Wednesday, French authorities indicted the criminals. Read on to learn more about the events that led to the arrest!
Who Stole The Bored Ape NFTs?
Between December 2021 to March 2022, five victims of the Bored Ape Yacht Club fell for carefully planned phishing scams. It involved the crooks reaching out to BAYC members and promising them an animated version of their Bored Apes. They would lead the collectors to the website that offered these services.
The victims would then have their NFTs stolen from them due to a phishing site lurking behind it. The site would steal the NFT handover codes of their victims without their knowledge. The NFT frauds would then transfer the NFTs to their wallets and sell them on popular digital marketplaces. One of the victims saw three of their precious Bored Apes stolen, one of it being worth over a million dollars.
The police investigated the Bored Ape NFT thieves around late August. It was ZachXBTs analysis and Twitter posts that started the search for the frauds. Two of the five arrested were responsible for the website’s marketing, while the others handled the money laundering.
The five masterminds behind the crypto theft all age between 19-24. Moreover, French authorities initially arrested seven people, including the parents of one of the scammers. Although, the parents have since been released as the investigation continues.
What Did ZachXBT’s Analysis Reveal?
Twitter user ZachXBT has been at the forefront of inspecting and exposing frauds, and bringing crypto criminals to justice. For this case, Zach caught on to the breadcrumbs that the scammers left behind via Tornado Cash, which led to unmasking the identities of two of them. Tornado cash is a service that allows people to “mask” their crypto funds and transactions. Furthermore, via this trail and other research, Zach dug out the official Telegram, Instagram, and Twitter ID’s of the perpetrators.
