Hackers are targeting DADI ICO investors with phishing emails

Swaths of concerned DADI ICO investors are rushing to Reddit and Telegram to report they are now being targeted in a co-ordinated phishing attack after the fledgling cryptocurrency startup failed to protect their credentials, including names and email addresses .

The fraudulent phishing emails ask recipients to sign up for a malicious version of popular cryptocurrency wallet MyEtherWallet, designed to steal your data and private keys. What makes the attack particularly sinister is that it relies on punycode techniques to trick users into submitting their information.

In addition to that, the hackers used an email ( [email protected] ) which closely resembles the authentic DADI address ( [email protected] ).

Here is a copy of the fake email as shared by affected DADI users:

TNW has since spoken to DADI community manager Bolaji Oyewole (more commonly known as @Bjay on Telegram and Discord) who told us that the “ email in question is a phishing scam, but it is not a new compromise.”

“ Rather a new attempt to defraud our community using data from the mailing list hack at the end of the Crowdsale period,” Oyewole added, linking to the following tweet:

“This attack was investigated at the time and appropriate steps taken to mitigate the impact (which includes reporting matters to the appropriate authorities, issuing community alerts etc.),” the community manager further said. “We also stopped using the system in question.”

“We would remind your readers to take appropriate steps to protect themselves,” he added. “A security update from the end of the Public sale can be seen here .”

Another DADI community rep who goes by the name Rick Kamp seconded Oyewole’s claims.

“ Back in January one of our third party email marketing vendors was compromised which we dealt with at the time,” he wrote on Telegram. “No KYC information was compromised and DADI was not hacked. This is simply a re-attempt to engage those emails. Kindly report the email as spam and delete. It’s a blatant scam attempt.”

While the startup continues to insist their system has not been compromised, it is advising users to ignore any emails that do not originate from their official email address [email protected]

Here is the full message:

Oyewole has further clarified that users can request to have their data deleted by DADI.

“ Phishing emails will come. Be safe, delete them and report,” he warned on Telegram. “We are aware and we take down the sites as fast as we can. We keep your data offline in one of the most secure locations in the UK.”

“If you want your profile deleted from the website, send a request to [email protected] ,” he finished.

For the record, this is not the first time DADI has dealt with controversy.

In addition to the email list breach which took place in January, the company got busted blatantly plagiarizing segments from the white paper of blockchain-powered competitor SONM. DADI eventually responded to the accusations in a Medium post , claiming the copied text was a “mistake” someone forgot to fix.

The cryptocurrency space is no stranger to this sort of mishaps, unfortunately.

Indeed, blockchain-powered Airbnb competitor, Bee Token, was involved in a similar accident last month . It remains unclear how widespread the DADI phishing attack is, but the Bee Token hackers ultimately managed to walk away with more than $1 million worth of Ethereum.

It took the internet two months to crack this puzzle game (and win 1 Bitcoin)

Someone has solved MonteCrypto: The Bitcoin Enigma – the viral cryptocurrency puzzle game that promised to reward the first player who solves its 24 “enigmas” with one Bitcoin.

Two months after premiering on Steam on February 20, creators Corentin Derbré and Scott Piriou have announced that a “fierce team” of eight players cracked the MonteCrypto mystery yesterday on April 24. The team has also claimed “the spoils of their victory” in the form of 1 BTC.

The winners have since transferred the funds out of the designated wallet where MonteCrypto creators hid the reward. To access the wallet, players had to recover the private key which was stored in a file, protected by a 24-word password; each enigma contained one of these 24 words.

“It’s been pretty amazing these past few months seeing everything you’ve been doing to get to the bottom of the enigma,” the game founders said. “MonteCrypto was also designed to be a social experiment of sorts, […] a test of collaboration vs. keeping secrets.”

“Looking at the different paths you’ve explored together trying to bring the experiment to its conclusion, both in terms of the sharing and the sabotage, has been pretty remarkable,” they continued.

The creators further added that the game will remain fully playable – though the BTC reward will no longer be on the table. They also hinted that the MonteCrypto story might not be entirely finished, but stopped short of sharing any clues.

Cryptocurrency-themed games have gradually been picking up steam following the CryptoKitties sensation in late 2017. Indeed, Ethereum creator Vitalik Buterin praised concepts like CryptoKitties for their ability to expose the general audience to blockchain tech and decentralized solutions.

Unlike CryptoKitties, which stores its characters on the Ethereum network, MonteCrypto did not rely on any blockchain solutions for its game. Nevertheless, its Bitcoin reward proved popular among both cryptocurrency enthusiasts and rookies.

For the record, the price of one Bitcoin was $9,302 at the time when the players solved MonteCrypto – a slight decrease compared to late February when the price fluctuated at around $11,000.

But hey, it is still a pretty hefty prize for solving a puzzle – and a wonderful way to get mainstream audiences into cryptocurrency and blockchain.

Mining costs show why 51 percent attacks on Bitcoin are easier than thought

There’s been a lot of controversy surrounding Bitcoin mining pretty much since its inception. The process of mining is so costly that it’s unfeasible for most people to be able to participate in the mining, leaving the control over the blockchain consensus mechanism to a select few people.

A recent interview between Bitfury CEO Valery Vavilov and journalist Laura Shin has now rekindled the debate.

Discussing the financial feasibility of Bitcoin mining, Vavilov told Shin that mining is profitable down to a price of $2,500-$3,000 per Bitcoin, even though it might vary a little by location.

The discussion attracted the attention of Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, who highlighted who highlighted that the figures confirm the capital costs of mining to be higher than the operational costs.

He argued that it is unrealistic to expect the 51 percent attackers to disband anytime soon because they already have their capital infrastructure in place, and the operational costs are in their favor.

Some users pointed out that Bitcoin mining for them becomes unprofitable at a price much higher than $3,000. Shin clarified that one of the reasons why these calculations would not apply to small-scale miners is due to Bitfury’s ability to manufacture their own mining rigs.

This entire discussion puts the focus on one important factor — it’s considerably cheaper for large-scale miners to mine BTC than it’s for small-scale ones. This is what leads to the monopoly over the blockchain consensus as well, and leads to the possibility of 51 percent attacks and tampering with blockchains.

This is hardly news at this point.

Concerns over 51 percent attacks have been imminent from the very beginning of the existence of cryptocurrencies. However, these recent events have brought the focus back to them. Cryptocurrencies work on decentralization of authority and if a few whale miners are going to control the entire consensus mechanism, then cryptocurrencies have lost the very essence of their existence.

The vulnerability of blockchains has been a hot topic in the cryptocurrency community recently, especially after the 51 percent attacks on two proof-of-work cryptocurrencies, Electroneum and Verge .

Last week, it became clear that Electroneum had fallen victim to a 51 percent attack after users noticed that a massive amount of empty blocks were being constantly mined on the currency’s blockchain one after another, preceded by a sudden drop in hashrate.

Following the Electroneum attack, Verge reportedly suffered a 51 percent attack too, purportedly losing around 250,000 XVG (approximately $21,500) to the attackers.

Even Bitcoin has had near-51 percent attack scares twice as Ghash.io, a Bitcoin mining pool, has come too close to controlling over 50 percent of hashing power. But this is hardly surprising when 90 percent of the overall Bitcoin mining power is owned by 16 miners .