One of the official X accounts belonging to ChatGPT’s parent company, OpenAI, was hacked by crypto scammers last night.
The hackers took over the company’s @OpenAINewsroom account around 7pm ET (Sep, 23). Usually, the corporate account is used to share updates and news surrounding the latest developments at the pioneering AI research firm. However, on Monday evening the account began to post about a so-called “$OPENAI” token to its 54,000 followers.
The post read: “We’re very happy to announce $OPEANAI: the token bridging the gap between Al and blockchain technology.
“All OpenAI users are eligible to claim a piece of $OPENAI’s initial supply. Holding $OPENAI will grant access to all of our future beta programs.”
The since-deleted tweet contained a link leading to a counterfeit OpenAI website.
The OpenAI Newsroom X account appears to be hacked.
The first line of the announcement even misspells the token handle ($OPEANAI vs $OPENAI).
Be careful out there… pic.twitter.com/3M7cFuCGn0
— TylerD (@Tyler_Did_It) September 23, 2024
OpenAI has been contacted for comment by ReadWrite.
At the time of writing, there have been no official statements from the account – which launched in June – regarding the incident.
OpenAI sees a rise in hacked accounts
It’s not the first large company, or even tech company, to see one of its social channels hacked in an attempted pump-and-dump crypto scam. Google subsidiary Mandiant, a cyber intelligence company bought by the search giant for $5.4bn, was hijacked in January when it was used to distribute a fake airdrop which led to those who interacted with it to have their wallets drainer.
Even the official X account of legendary heavy metal band Metallica was briefly compromised to promote a crypto scam. The hackers used the opportunity in June to promote a fraudulent Solana-based (SOL) token with the ticker METAL .
But the X accounts of OpenAI and its staff appear to have been targeted specifically in recent weeks. On Sunday, OpenAI researcher Jason Wei’s account was hijacked to promote another fake $OPENAI token launch. Similarly, both Jakub Pachocki, OpenAI’s Chief Scientist, and Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati had their accounts temporarily taken over.
The FBI estimated that $5.6 billion was lost to crypto-related crime last year, a 45% increase from what was seen in 2022.
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