Quick take:
A non-fungible token (NFT) racketeer Elliot, nicknamed Chinese or Devil has been exposed for stealing more than $5 million in NFT scams orchestrated using phishing links and rug pulls.
Crypto investigator ZachXBT believes the scammer has been duping unsuspecting NFT traders since October last year.
Zach’s research took him as far back as Elliot’s NFT collection Crazy Lemur Club (CLC), his colleague. At the time, the two went by the name “Cat” & “Dog” as the creative minds behind the project.
A phishing link is an internet link created for the purpose of deceiving anyone who clicks on it to visit a malicious website, where they could end up losing important information about their crypto wallets or buying a fake product.
On the other hand, a rug pull is an NFT project created for the purpose of raising money from unsuspecting retail traders without the intention of ever delivering the promises of the project. In most cases, rug-pulled NFT projects are shut down within months.
According to Zach, Elliot used both avenues to steal more than $5 million in crypto and NFT scams.
His first NFT rug pull occurred in November 2021 after shutting down the Discord channel and website associated with the Crazy Lemur Club (CLC) NFT collection. His colleague “Dog” soon took to Instagram to shame the act, labelling “Cat” a scammer.
“Devil on Instagram Cat aka Chinese aka Elliot is a scammer do not deal with him, he will f you up and claim he’s a millionaire,” Dog wrote on Instagram in November 2021.
The collection had reportedly made 82 ETH ~$320k at the time, which were eventually sent to crypto mixing platform Tornado Cash.
In August, Tornado cash was found to have been used by NFT scammers to launder 52% of the $100 million stolen between July 2021 and July 2022, Elliptic reported.
The platform was also sanctioned by the US government as part of an ongoing crackdown on platforms used by criminals to launder crypto.
According to ZackXBT, Devil/Elliot shifted the blame to his colleague “Dog” after one of the victims of the CLC NFT confronted him on Instagram.
In 2022, Elliot decided to focus on phishing links, which sent those who clicked on them to fake Sudoswap and NFT Trader websites. Cryptanosaurus was one of the earliest victims of Devil/Elliot’s new strategy, losing two Bored Ape NFTs to the scammer on Jan 4, 2022.
In Mid Jan, “Cat” was at it again, this time stealing multiple CloneX and various other NFTs using 0x9114, with the username “Matthew Stokey” on OpenSea.
At the start of February, bo66ydigital lost 1 BAYC and 2 MAYC to the scammer.
today I got hacked for my MAYC #1819, #7713 and my BAYC #4329. I am devastated and bought these in the last few months so they cost me a lot of money…any help, please report this, as I am lost. I cant believe how shady people can be & not think twice @opensea @BoredApeYC
According to Zack’s findings, Elliot used Tornado cash to clean money made from phishing scams. In early 2022, the scammer made several deposits to the platform.
Elliot has since orchestrated more phishing scams using different names, including 0x0Poor in February, which Zach matched to the Instagram user ‘$ex’.
Recent online activity suggests that Elliot is a customer of renowned crypto scammer Monkey Drainer, ZachXBT wrote.
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