- Upbit, South Korea’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, is grappling with a major security breach that has rocked the crypto community.
- The scale of the breach was staggering, impacting an estimated 100,000 accounts, all of which held APT deposits. Notably, the total value of the fake APT tokens surprisingly reached $3.4 billion.
- An expert’s examination revealed that the fake APT tokens were not actually the local Aptos Network token but a fake token called ‘ClaimAPTGift.’
The Aptos (APT) scam that occurred on Upbit exchange has stirred the waters: Thousands of accounts were affected, and the amount of fake tokens reached massive proportions.
The Aptos (APT) Scam Shaking Upbit
Upbit, South Korea’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, is trying to cope with a major security breach that has shaken the crypto community. This came after the exchange discovered on early Sunday that a fake deposit had been made. Scammers successfully deposited a fake token into their platform, passing it off as the genuine Aptos (APT) token.
The shocking breach came to light when Upbit’s system incorrectly identified the fake token as APT. This allowed a bot to deposit significant amounts of fake tokens into user accounts. This incident was reported by COINOTAG.
The scale of the breach was staggering, impacting an estimated 100,000 accounts, all of which held APT deposits. Notably, the total value of the fake APT tokens surprisingly reached $3.4 billion, making it one of the largest cryptocurrency security breaches in recent times. There were also reports that many Korean users claimed to have received APT tokens without initiating the transactions themselves.
In response to the breach, Upbit took immediate action to protect its users and suspended APT deposit and withdrawal services, citing the need for wallet system maintenance:
“We are suspending Aptos (APT) deposit and withdrawal services due to maintenance of the Aptos (APT) wallet system. We will resume deposit and withdrawal services once the maintenance is completed and will update you through this announcement when the service resumes.”
Behind the Scenes: How Did the Scammers Do It?
South Korean crypto expert and co-founder of TUNABOT, “Mingmingbbs,” helped uncover crucial details about the breach on social media. The expert’s investigation revealed that the fake APT tokens were actually not the local Aptos Network token but a fake token called ‘ClaimAPTGift.’
According to Mingmingbbs, the issue stemmed from Upbit’s system failing to correctly verify the type of transferred tokens and inadvertently processing all tokens as the same APT token. Normally, it should have checked specific conditions, such as whether the tokens matched a particular type. Fortunately, disaster was somehow averted because the scammer was using a different decimal system for the token, preventing users from receiving $25,000 instead of $250. This avoided a situation that could have caused a “significant issue.”
Despite this incident, investors seem unaffected and are pumping APT, dismissing the news as typical FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt). At the time of writing, Aptos is trading at over $5.28, up more than 5% in the last 24 hours.
