Quote:An attacker was apparently able to breach the site for famed street artist Banksy and sell a fake non-fungible token (NFT) of the artist’s work for more than $336,000.
The fraudster has since returned the ill-gotten cash, less a “transaction fee.” But the incident has delivered an invaluable lesson on a whole new emerging cybersecurity threat: NFTs.
In this instance the attacker hosted an auction on the real Banksy site, banksy.co.uk, for what was billed as the first-ever Bansky NFT, according to BBC.
When a collector purchases an NFT, it doesn’t give them ownership or copyright over the image itself. Rather, it lets the purchaser own a piece of the item in the form of a “token” that’s recorded forever on its blockchain.
An anonymous British collector the BBC identifies as “prominent” and who goes by the name “Pranksy” was willing to offer 90 percent more than the next-highest bidder to score the Banksy NFT certificate. After handing over more than $336,000 in Ethereum, the bidder realized he had been conned.
“It does seem to be some hack of the site. I confirmed the URL on PC and mobile before bidding,” Pransky told BBC. “I only made the bid because it was hosted on his site. When the bid was accepted, I immediately thought it was probably fake.” He added that he suspects he was alerted to the sale by the attacker.
Read more: NFT Collector Tricked into Buying Fake Banksy | Threatpost
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