Crypto Users Face Surge in Address Poisoning Scams, Losing Over $1.6 Million

According to Cointelegraph, unsuspecting cryptocurrency users have fallen victim to address poisoning scams, resulting in losses exceeding $1.6 million in just one week. This figure surpasses the total losses recorded in March, which amounted to $1.2 million. The scams involve mimicking legitimate wallet addresses, leading users to mistakenly copy and paste incorrect addresses during transactions. A notable incident occurred on Friday when a victim lost 140 Ether (ETH), valued at approximately $636,500, after copying a contaminated address from their transfer history. ScamSniffer, a crypto scam prevention platform, reported that the victim inadvertently sent funds to a lookalike address seeded in their transaction history. The platform emphasized that the victim's history was filled with poison address attacks, making it inevitable for the trap to succeed. Further reports indicate that another victim lost $880,000 worth of cryptocurrency to address poisoning on Sunday. Additional alerts revealed losses of $80,000 and $62,000 on Wednesday due to similar scams. Cybersecurity firms have compiled data showing that more than $1.6 million has been lost to scammers through address poisoning since Sunday. Address poisoning scams operate by sending small transactions from wallet addresses that closely resemble legitimate ones. This tactic deceives users into copying the wrong address when conducting future transactions. Web3 Antivirus, a blockchain security firm, explained that poisoners send minor transfers from addresses mimicking real ones, turning transaction history into a trap. In addition to address poisoning, malicious signature signing has contributed to significant losses. At least $600,000 was lost this week from victims who signed phishing signatures such as "approve," "increaseAllowance," and "permit." On Tuesday, a victim lost $165,000 worth of BLOCK and DOLO tokens after signing malicious signatures, as reported by ScamSniffer. ScamSniffer advises users to utilize an address book or whitelist and verify the full address before sending funds to prevent falling prey to these scams. The platform reiterated the importance of these precautions, highlighting the ongoing threat posed by address poisoning and malicious signature signing in the crypto space.