User loses $91 million in Bitcoin to social engineering attack

Blockchain investigator ZachXBT has revealed that a Bitcoin holder lost roughly $91 million in a single transaction this week after falling victim to a social engineering scam.

The theft occurred last Tuesday, when the victim transferred 783 BTC (worth $114,601 each at the time) to an address controlled by the attacker. Blockchain data shows the funds were quickly moved to a new Bitcoin address before being laundered through Wasabi Wallet, a privacy-focused service that conceals transaction trails.

Social engineering attacks typically involve tricking victims into revealing sensitive information, such as wallet recovery phrases or private keys. In this case, impostors posing as customer support for a crypto exchange and a hardware wallet provider convinced the victim to authorize the transaction.

“Assume that every call or email received is a scam by default,” ZachXBT warned in a post on X, urging crypto investors to be vigilant.

While ZachXBT did not identify a perpetrator, he ruled out North Korea’s state-sponsored Lazarus Group, which has been linked to several major crypto hacks.

The incident is the latest in a wave of social engineering and phishing schemes plaguing the crypto industry. Scammers have increasingly impersonated hardware wallet makers like Ledger and Trezor, even sending physical letters urging users to hand over their recovery phrases under the guise of “critical security updates.”

Crypto-related theft remains a multibillion-dollar problem. More than $2.1 billion was stolen across the sector in the first five months of 2025, according to blockchain security firm CertiK, with wallet compromises and phishing attacks accounting for the majority of losses. The largest incident so far this year was the $1.4 billion Bybit exchange exploit in February.

Tuesday’s theft also came exactly one year after the $243 million Genesis creditor hack, underscoring the persistent vulnerabilities in crypto security.