{"id":138155,"date":"2023-04-27T13:18:46","date_gmt":"2023-04-27T13:18:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/?p=138155"},"modified":"2023-04-27T15:14:48","modified_gmt":"2023-04-27T15:14:48","slug":"over-3000-victims-lost-4-16-million-crypto-to-google-ads-scam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/over-3000-victims-lost-4-16-million-crypto-to-google-ads-scam\/","title":{"rendered":"Over 3,000 Victims Lost $4.16 Million Crypto to Google Ads Scam"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">According to Google Ads data and blockchain analytics,<strong> at least $4.16 million has been stolen from users who fell for malicious cryptocurrency phishing websites promoted on Google<\/strong>. Scam Sniffer, a <a href=\"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/what-is-web3\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Web3<\/a> anti-scam platform, published on its blog a <a href=\"https:\/\/drops.scamsniffer.io\/post\/4-million-stolen-due-to-google-search-ad-phishing\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">report<\/a> on Google searches, which suffered from cryptocurrency phishing and resulted in losses for more than 3,000 victims,<strong> most of which occurred in the last month<\/strong>.<br \/>\n<!--more--><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Investigations by Scam Sniffer revealed that users clicked on malicious ads and were directed to fraudulent websites. <strong>Most of the so-called malicious ads come from Ukraine and Canada<\/strong>, including fake versions of popular platforms such as Lido, Defiliama, Zapper, and some other decentralized exchanges and websites.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">1\/ \ud83d\udea8 A recent surge in phishing scams via Google search ads has led to users losing approximately $4 million.<br \/>ScamSniffer has investigated multiple cases where users clicked on malicious ads and were directed to fraudulent websites.<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/PhishingScams?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">#PhishingScams<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/GoogleAds?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">#GoogleAds<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/vuKCgSuFnV\" target=\"_blank\">pic.twitter.com\/vuKCgSuFnV<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Scam Sniffer (@realScamSniffer) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/realScamSniffer\/status\/1651452380385509377?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">April 27, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Slight changes to the official URLs of these popular platforms make it difficult for users to identify that they have clicked on malicious links.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Analysis of several relatively large fund collection addresses showed that some of the victims&#8217; assets were deposited into SimpleSwap or the crypto-mixing platform Tornado.Cash,<strong> while some went directly to centralized exchanges like KuCoin and Binance<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<h2>Scammers employ several tricks to circumvent Google Ads rules<\/h2>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-138157 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Google.jpg\" alt=\"Scammers employ several tricks to circumvent Google Ads rules\" width=\"825\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Google.jpg 825w, https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Google-300x109.jpg 300w, https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Google-768x279.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 825px) 100vw, 825px\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The users responsible for placing the malicious ads use several methods to bypass Google&#8217;s ad review process, tricking the review of Google ads, resulting in these advertisements being finally seen by users and causing serious loss. <strong>One of these methods involves manipulating the Google Click ID parameter,<\/strong> allowing attackers to show a normal webpage during Google&#8217;s ad review.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Additionally, based on an estimated 40% conversion rate from 7,500 users clicking on the malicious ads, the scammers spent about $15,000 to advertise the websites.<strong> The scammers&#8217; return on investment has been roughly 276% since more than $4 million was stolen.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Scams and fraud continue to be rampant in the crypto space, and phishing attacks are a significant threat to users&#8217; funds. Meanwhile, phishing is one of the most common methods scammers employ to steal cryptocurrency from users. With over $3.7 billion in thefts in 2022, the crypto space, and particularly DeFi, <strong>continues to be one of the hackers&#8217; preferred playgrounds<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Therefore, <strong>users should be cautious when clicking on links, particularly those that appear in Google Ads or other search engines<\/strong>. It is essential to verify the authenticity of any sites that request sensitive information and to use only trusted platforms and exchanges.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to Google Ads data and blockchain analytics, at least $4.16 million has been stolen from users who fell for malicious cryptocurrency phishing websites promoted on Google. Scam Sniffer, a Web3 anti-scam platform, published on its blog a report on Google searches, which suffered from cryptocurrency phishing and resulted in losses for more than 3,000 &#8230; <\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more-container\"><a title=\"Over 3,000 Victims Lost $4.16 Million Crypto to Google Ads Scam\" class=\"read-more button\" href=\"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/over-3000-victims-lost-4-16-million-crypto-to-google-ads-scam\/#more-138155\" aria-label=\"More on Over 3,000 Victims Lost $4.16 Million Crypto to Google Ads Scam\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":42118,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[111,84,74],"tags":[9496,5287,4707],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138155"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=138155"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138155\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=138155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=138155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crypto-economy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=138155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}