Hackers Took Control of Famous NFT Artist Beeple’s Twitter Account

Hackers took control of the Twitter account of the well-known NFT artist Beeple on Sunday.

Mike Winkelmann, who goes by Beeple, confirmed the hack on Sunday morning after regaining control of his account.

“Ugh we’ll [sic] that was fun way to wake up. Twitter was hacked but we have control now,” he wrote in a tweet. “Stay safe out there, anything too good to be true IS A FUCKING SCAM.”

While in control of Beeple’s account, the hackers announced a surprise mint—a promotional campaign where artists create and sell limited-run non-fungible tokens representing a piece of art on top of blockchains such as Ethereum—for a collection in collaboration with Louis Vuitton and “extra” art that Beeple never released before. The scam gathered around $270,000 in ETH and stole 45 NFTs worth around $165,000, according to Harry.eth, who works in cybersecurity for the crypto wallet company MetaMask. 

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Winkelmann did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

The artist gained notoriety in March of last year, when Christie’s auctioned an NFT collection of Beeple’s artwork for $69,346,250, the third largest sale by a living artist, and the largest NFT sale ever.

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