The security team at Binance has assisted in recovering a portion of the digital assets lost by crypto influencer NFT God in a previous exploit. In a recent tweet, NFT God expressed gratitude towards the Binance security team for returning a portion of the $150,000 worth of digital assets that were stolen by Russian hackers several months ago.
“9 months ago members of a Russian mob hacked my computer and stole $150,000 of digital assets,” NFT God explained. “Today, a portion of that was returned to me by the security team at Binance.”
Binance proactively tracked the activities of the Russian hackers for months, diligently retrieving the stolen funds as the hackers transferred them. Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao acknowledged the efforts, stating, “Doing our little bit.”
Back in January, NFT God experienced a devastating exploit in which he lost all his NFTs and access to social media accounts. Alex, also known as NFT God, accidentally clicked on a sponsored Google Ads link for video streaming software that turned out to be malware. Unbeknownst to him, the link contained malicious software that provided backdoor access to the hackers.
The breach became evident when a series of phishing tweets were sent from NFT God’s compromised accounts. On-chain data revealed that the hackers stole 19 ETH, an NFT from the Mutant Ape Yacht Club (MAYC) valued at 16 ETH, and other NFTs. The attackers then funneled and swapped the funds for unknown tokens using the Fixed Float, a decentralized exchange.
Soon after the incident, Alex discovered that his Substack account had also been breached. The attackers sent emails containing phishing links to his 16,000 subscribers. Alex expressed his distress, saying, “Every channel I have with my community, friends, and family was compromised over the last 24 hours. My Twitter, Substack, Gmail, Discord, and wallets were all invaded and taken over by bad actors.”
Turbulence in the NFT Market
The NFT market has recently endured a challenging period marked by a sharp decline in trading volume and plummeting floor prices. According to a report by Alchemy, NFT trading volume in July witnessed a 29% decline, amounting to $632 million, while token sales plummeted by 23% to $3.7 million.
In addition to these challenges, tension between traders and creators of digital collectibles has escalated due to controversies surrounding royalty rates. Top NFT exchanges such as Blur and OpenSea recently decided to reduce the royalty rates paid to artists when ownership of a token changes hands. The rationale behind this decision is to lower costs and encourage more buying and selling in a market that has experienced a drastic 95% decrease in trading volumes since January 2022, from $17 billion to a mere fraction.
As a result of the reduced royalty rates, royalties diminished from a peak of $269 million in January to $4.3 million in July, with rates dropping from as high as 5% per transaction to a meager 0.6%.
