Pink Drainer Falls Prey to Scam

Pink Drainer, a notorious wallet-draining group, has seemingly been given a taste of their own medicine after falling victim to an 'address poisoning' scam. The incident has drawn attention across the crypto community, shedding light on the vulnerabilities even seasoned scammers can face.

The crypto compliance platform MistTrack highlighted the July 7 attack in a post to X. The hacking group lost 10 Ether (ETH) to the scam, worth around $30,000 at current prices. The loss occurred in late June, marking a significant blow to the infamous group.

The Mechanics of Address Poisoning

Speaking to Cointelegraph, MistTrack explained how an address poisoning scam unfolds. An attacker sends small amounts of crypto from a wallet with a similar-looking address to one of the target's regular wallets, trying to trick the target into accidentally sending funds to the incorrect wallet.

"Scammers have bots that look for new transactions. Since they can't crack the code on the whole address, it's possible to make the first and last few characters look similar to the address used," MistTrack elaborated.

"So the scammer is banking on the victim to [copy the] scam address instead of the victim's original address," they added. "Scammers have bots that look for new transactions."

In this case, the attackers sent funds from a wallet address with an almost identical identifier to Pink Drainer's previous wallet. This duped Pink Drainer into accidentally sending the fake address, 10 ETH.

A Sudden Retirement

The scam comes just a month after a surprise announcement from Pink Drainer on May 17. The group declared it would be retiring its services after reaching its stated goal of helping steal over $85 million in crypto assets. According to Dune Analytics data, Pink Drainer stole $85.3 million in crypto beginning in July 2023.

While Pink Drainer may have halted its operations, the crypto community remains highly alert. Several other drainer toolkit services, including Angel Drainer, Pussy Drainer, and Venom Drainer, continue to aid nefarious actors in stealing crypto assets. The rise of these services underscores the ongoing challenges in securing digital assets.