Blast Ecosystem Encounters Rug Pull as RiskOnBlast Extracts $1.3M in ETH from Supporters

Ethereum (ETH) Layer 2 scaling solution Blast’s ecosystem witnessed its very first incident of a rug pull. An unnamed account, RiskOnBlast, presented itself as a gambling and exchange platform, successfully raising 420 ETH (around $1.3 million) from investors in a recent seed funding round before abruptly disappearing. This account was also involved in Blast’s Big Bang competition, where success could lead to additional financial backing for their platform.

On Sunday, all social media accounts related to the project were deleted. The funds that appear to have been misappropriated originated from over 750 wallets. Significantly, approximately $500,000 was moved to the swapping service ChangeNow, while $360,000 went to the cryptocurrency exchange MEXC, and another $187,000 was sent to Bybit, another exchange, as revealed by Onchain analysts. Somaxbt .

Blast had earlier provided updates about the project on its official X account, expressing excitement about its undeniable potential. Although Blast itself does not govern the projects operating on its blockchain, such social media endorsements can be misleadingly interpreted by investors as a mark of legitimacy.

One investor indicated a loss of more than $12,500, which sparked criticism from market analysts regarding the lack of thorough due diligence and the inherent risks of investing in projects that spring up seemingly out of nowhere. For certain investors, the overwhelming enthusiasm surrounding the project symbolized the resurgence of the bull market, where inflated valuations can lead to hasty investments without adequate scrutiny.

PeckShield's monitoring has revealed that the majority of the funds taken during the rug pull from the Blast ecosystem game, Risk, have been moved to exchanges like ChangeNow, Bybit, MEXC, and SideShift, with a smaller portion of the stolen assets being cross-chain transferred to Arbitrum and Cosmos.

#PeckShieldAlert Coindesk has reported that @Riskonblast has rugged 420 $ETH ($1.3m).
The bulk of the stolen assets has already been sent to #ChangeNow , #Bybit , #MEXC , and #SideShift A minor fraction of the stolen assets has been bridged over to #Arbitrum & #Cosmos . uk uz uz

— PeckShieldAlert (@PeckShieldAlert) vi

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Blast is a Layer 2 scaling solution built on Ethereum, designed to generate native yield opportunities for both ETH and stablecoins, achieved through ETH staking and Real World Asset (RWA) protocols. It was developed by the team behind the popular non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace, BLUR, and secured $20 million in funding from Paradigm and Standard Crypto shortly after its launch last year. The official mainnet for Blast is expected to be unveiled in February 2024, with points redemption anticipated in May 2024. Search A total of 47 projects have been recognized as winners in its developer competition, selected from a competitive pool of 3,000 applicants. The victorious teams are set to receive undisclosed financing in the coming months aimed at fostering growth within the burgeoning blockchain ecosystem.

Search Hack Seasons In light of the rapid development and expansion of the Blast ecosystem, the recent challenges serve as a timely reminder of the need for vigilance as the project forges ahead with its innovative efforts.

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