Crypto whale loses $24M in staked Ethereum to phishing attack

A cryptocurrency whale has fallen victim to a massive phishing attack, losing millions of dollars in staked Ether (

According to anti-scam source Scam Sniffer, the victim enabled token approvals to the scammer by signing “Increase Allowance” transactions.

*“Increase Allowance” method on the phisher’s transaction. Source: Etherscan*

Allowance or access permissions are a feature of ERC-20 tokens that enable a third party to have the right to spend some tokens that belong to a different owner, using smart contracts. Some cryptocurrency observers have warned against risks associated with approving ERC-20 allowances, noting that anonymous developers could deploy malicious smart contracts to scam users.

The news comes shortly after at least five Ethereum liquid staking providers — Rocket Pool, StakeWise, Stader Labs and Diva Staking — imposed or started working to impose a self-limit rule in which they promise not to own more than 22% of the Ethereum staking market.

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