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Ethereum (ETH<\/a>) creator Vitalik Buterin says that hackers used a SIM-swap scam to take over his account on the social media platform X to commit theft.<\/p>\n In a new post on the decentralized social network Farcaster, Buterin says<\/a> that whoever committed the offense took over his T-Mobile phone number.<\/p>\n \u201cFinally got back my T-Mobile account (yes, it was a SIM-swap, meaning that someone socially engineered T-Mobile itself to take over my phone number).\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n SIM swapping happens when scammers contact a mobile phone carrier and trick them into activating the scam target\u2019s phone number on a SIM card that they have. Once they have the SIM card activated they attempt to use it to intercept two-factor authentication codes (2FA) for the person\u2019s accounts.<\/p>\n After taking over Buterin\u2019s X (previously known as Twitter) account, the fraudsters promoted a non-fungible token (NFT) scam and reportedly<\/a> made off with $691,000.<\/p>\n Says Buterin,<\/p>\n \u201cMain learning regarding Twitter was: <\/em><\/p>\n A phone number is sufficient to password reset a Twitter account even if not used as 2FA. <\/em><\/p>\n Can completely remove phone from Twitter. <\/em><\/p>\n I had seen the \u2018phone numbers are insecure, don\u2019t authenticate with them\u2019 advice before, but did not realize this. I don\u2019t remember when I *added* the number; my guess is that it was required to sign up for Twitter blue.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n He also says<\/a> he\u2019s happy to be using Farcaster because his account recovery can be controlled by an Ethereum address.<\/p>\n Farcaster co-founder Dan Romero welcomed<\/a> Buterin to his platform last year.<\/p>\n Don’t Miss a Beat \u2013 Subscribe<\/a> to get email alerts delivered directly to your inbox <\/span><\/em>
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