OpenSea freezes $2.2M of stolen Bored Apes After NFT Theft
OpenSea, a nonfungible tokens (NFT) marketplace, has frozen 16 Bored Ape and Mutant Ape nonfungible tokens (NFT) after allegedly being taken from a New York art gallery operator yesterday. One Clonex, seven Mutant Ape Yacht Club, and eight Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs were taken in total, with a total value of 615 ETH ($2.28 million). In addition, they are no longer available for trading on OpenSea.
The toddkramer.eth account, linked to the Ross+Kramer Art Gallery in New York, sent out a series of tweets revealing the 16 NFTs stolen from his hot wallet and begging for assistance from OpenSea and the NFT community. While the NFT community was generally unsupportive of the trader, OpenSea halted trading on the stolen items.
Some traders criticize the absence of decentralization, one of the most prized elements of the crypto business, due to the freeze on purchasing and selling NFTs. "Who was able to freeze then?" said kw.sol on Twitter.
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A hot wallet is a cryptocurrency software wallet that is always connected to the internet, most frequently MetaMask regardless of whether the device it is installed on is connected to the internet. Kramer claimed that a phishing scheme acquired access to his hot wallet after he clicked on a malicious link and lost his collection as a result. Following the intense hostility in the comments, he removed the tweet.
While Kramer has few options for recovering the stolen NFTs, his experience underscores the necessity of good operational security (opsec) for bitcoin traders and NFT collectors. NFT traders, particularly those familiar with the Bored Ape Yacht Club collection, have had similar experiences to Kramer's. On Dec. 26, NFT collector bergpay.eth stated he, too, had 5 Jungle Freaks and 2 Sandbox NFTs stolen from his Ethereum wallet, and his ENS domain was transferred to a different address, identical to Kramer.
