FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried will compensate its users affected by the recent phishing attack with a one-time $6 million.
Recently, some crypto traders on the FTX crypto exchange, founded by Sam Bankman-Fried, had their accounts compromised due to exposed application programming interface (API) keys provided by 3Commas, a crypto-focused automated trading platform.
At least, about three users were affected in the attack, losing millions of dollars. After several moments of back-and-forth investigation on the incident by FTX and 3Commas, CEO Bankman-Fried took to Twitter on Sunday to announce that the cryptocurrency exchange plans to reimburse the affected users.
FTX CEO to Compensate Affected Users With $6 Million
Bankman-Fried began by addressing the issue of phishing, urging users to exercise caution when dealing with online websites for safety reasons. He further noted that the affected users will be compensated with a one-time $6 million, adding that FTX will “not do this going forward.”
According to FTX’s CEO, the cryptocurrency exchange won’t make a habit of compensating for users getting phished by fake versions of other companies.
“We can’t compensate for users getting phished by fake versions of other companies in the space! THIS IS A ONE-TIME THING AND WE WILL NOT DO THIS GOING FORWARD. THIS IS NOT A PRECEDENT.”
Meanwhile, Bankman-Fried also called on the hacker(s) to return the funds. He said if 95% of the stolen funds are returned to FTX accounts within 24 hours, the hackers will be “absolved” from any legal liability. On the side of the FTX security team, Bankman-Fried said they are active and working towards protecting its consumers from phishing scams as their data have been safeguarded with 2-factor Authentication (2FA).
Crypto Hacks on The Rise
Online scams have since been a major challenge in the crypto industry, these scams continue getting much more advanced and tricky each day, especially “phishing scams.” This type of scam has been majorly used in exploiting users of several crypto exchange companies and financial organizations.
So far this year, more than $3 billion in cryptocurrencies have been lost to hackers, according to Chainalysis.
