Crypto companies suffer supply chain email breach, users likely to face series of phishing scams

Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino and CoinGecko co-founder Bobby Ong warned the crypto community on Wednesday that a popular email vendor used by several crypto companies may have been compromised. As a result, they said users must exercise caution not to fall victim to phishing scams and fake airdrop launches.

Crypto companies suffer potential email breach

In an X post on Wednesday, Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino stated that they received two confirmations that a prominent email vendor, whose clients include several crypto companies, suffered an attack. While the issue is being investigated, he advised users to avoid airdrop-related emails received in the past 24 hours.

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CoinGecko co-founder Bobby Ong also confirmed the warnings of Ardoino, stating that they may be affected by the breach.

"There is an ongoing supply chain email breach attack happening with an email newsletter vendor right now [...] We at CoinGecko may be potentially affected and are actively working with our vendor to investigate further to determine the extent of this breach," said Ong.

Ong also clarified that CoinGecko isn't planning to launch any tokens as scammers will likely target users with an email blast of fake token launches and phishing links in the coming days. Several crypto community members also confirmed that they've received a series of phishing emails from top crypto companies in the past 24 hours.

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Crypto phishing scams are attempts by bad actors to trick users into revealing key information about their crypto wallets or exchange accounts, such as passwords, seed phrases or private keys. These scammers carry out the process by leveraging emails that lure users to fake websites by impersonating prominent crypto platforms.

Such scams often thrive in bull market cycles, especially due to the emergence of new users who are less knowledgeable about cryptocurrencies and increased greed among market participants. Crypto platforms like OpenSea, Ledger and Celsius have previously suffered these kinds of email attacks.

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Despite fears following the potential email breach, the market seems to be faring well, as the global crypto market cap is up more than 2% in the last 24 hours.