Crypto investors are becoming targets of cyber attackers with different methods every day, resulting in massive losses. In the latest incident, investors who downloaded a wallet application through the Windows Store had hundreds of thousands of dollars stolen. As hackers continue to develop new methods, the crypto community needs to be much more cautious.
Windows Store Ledger Live
ZachXBT, one of the most famous crypto trackers, recently warned investors about a new attack method. He alerted about the attackers who managed to publish an application called “Ledger Live Web3” on the Windows Store. Crypto investors try to secure their assets by storing them in physical Ledger wallets, but these types of fake applications result in the emptying of the wallets of the careless users.
The attacker who uploaded the fake application to the store stole approximately $588,000 worth of BTC in 38 transactions using the wallet address “bc1q…y64q”. ZachXBT noted that Microsoft may have removed the fake Ledger Live application from its platform.
The first entry to the scammer’s wallet was made on October 24th with $5,210 worth of BTC. The wallet had never been used before. Most of these transactions occurred since November 2nd, with the largest transfer being $81,200 on November 4th.
Crypto Investors as Targets
The application called Ledger Live Web3 entered the Windows app store on October 19th and initially appeared to be published by Ledger. The same applies to the Google Chrome extension store, where we see similar fake applications targeting investors. Therefore, it is safest for investors to access applications through trusted links on the official website.
We have repeatedly mentioned the risks of accessing applications and DeFi protocols from Google search results. Considering that attackers are developing new methods every day, it is essential to be much more cautious about the applications you download and the websites you log into that are related to your crypto wallet.
On the other hand, ZachXBT stated that they received two messages from victims on November 4th and even argued that Microsoft should be held responsible for allowing the fake Ledger Live application to appear in the app store.
This is not the first incident for the Windows Store, as similar incidents have occurred in December and March.