Robinhood’s Verified Twitter Account was Hacked and Started Promoting a Crypto Scam – This is What Happened Next

Binance Changpeng Zhao Fraud Robinhood Scam Security

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Sead Fadilpašić

Journalist

Sead Fadilpašić

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Sead specializes in writing factual and informative articles to help the public navigate the ever-changing world of crypto. He has extensive experience in the blockchain industry, where he has served...

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October 23, 2023

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Attackers hacked into major US online trading platform Robinhood‘s social media accounts to promote a scam token. Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao soon said that the account linked to the incident had been locked.

On Wednesday, the platform’s official Twitter account, RobinhoodApp, posted a “reminder” to its 1.1 million followers that it was launching the RHB token on Binance Smart Chain, offering users to purchase coins for $0.0005 apiece. It included a link to the PancakeSwap platform, where the token is listed.

While Robinhood did not post anything about the hack on its own account, it did admit to it in a comment section of another person’s post, saying that Twitter wasn’t the only account affected, and writing:

“We’re aware of the unauthorized posts from Robinhood Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook profiles, which were all removed within minutes. At this time, based on our ongoing investigation, we believe the source of the incident was via a third party vendor.

The original post has since been deleted, but it’s still available via an archive.org snapshot, and many users had grabbed screenshots before the company removed the post. 

Robinhood presumably hacked pic.twitter.com/UgRD3UCbo9

— db (@tier10k) January 25, 2023

And this wasn’t the end: given that Binance and its blockchain had been mentioned in this incident, the exchange’s CEO Zhao, known as CZ, said that the account in question had been locked and that there is an ongoing investigation. 

Our security team also noticed that and have locked the account pending further investigations.

— CZ 🔶 BNB (@cz_binance) January 25, 2023

CZ further added:

“Always have critical thinking even is the account looks or is real.”

Meanwhile, Conor Grogan, the head of product business operations at major crypto exchange Coinbase, reported that about 10 people had bought some $1,000 worth of the token before the tweet was removed. 

The token is a "honeypot" and will not allow users to sell or transfer after they purchase it pic.twitter.com/WzLpgM7r91

— Conor (@jconorgrogan) January 25, 2023

You can read more about scams in the cryptoworld here.

Meanwhile, earlier in January, the US Department of Justice seized the contested 56 million shares of Robinhood, worth approximately $500 million, owned by Sam Bankman-Fried, founder and former CEO of the failed FTX exchange, and FTX co-founder Gary Wang.

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Learn more: 
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– Binance CEO Says They’re Closer to Identifying Hacker Behind $570,000,000 Exploit

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