Fake Bakkt giveaway scams users

Bakkt, the recently-launched Bitcoin features trading platform, has witnessed its first scam attack, as a fake Bakkt giveaway website became operational. 

Fraudsters created the fake Medium page at the bakktlaunch.com domain, which claims that the official Bakkt team developed it. 

The way the scam works is simple: users are provided with two links, one for Bitcoin and one for Ethereum, which request a small deposit for wallet address verification. Once a deposit is received, the website claims that users will get free funds in the respective cryptocurrency.

Fake Bakkt giveaway

While the scam website has done a pretty good job of impersonating an official Bakkt page, the set up of the giveaway is the first warning sign that this is indeed a fraudulent endeavor.

In order to give credibility to their Bakkt giveaway, scammers tried to replicate official details released by the platform, like the fact that Bakkt has a storage warehouse insured for more than one hundred and twenty-five million dollars ($125 million).

According to the page, there are currently 5000 BTC and 10000 ETH waiting to be given away to users. 

Medium response

While the scam page is indeed hosted on Medium, the platform has recognized the malicious intent behind it. Following the discovery, Medium has suspended the fake Bakkt giveaway webpage, and according to the website, an investigation is currently underway.

Until now there has been no recorded activity towards the two wallet addresses given for Bitcoin and Etherum. However, crypto scam specialists claim that the links may be generating individual wallet addresses for each user who clicks on the link, in order to disguise the fraudulent nature of the giveaway.