In case you missed it, Seth Green’s Bored Ape NFT, stolen in May 2022, is back home! This is a welcomed announcement, as that means it’s likely we’ll still get Seth Green’s long-awaited TV show White Horse Tavern.
However, what can be done to prevent future NFT hacks of this type?
Table of Contents
- How was Seth Green’s Bored Ape NFT stolen?
- What is a phishing scam?
- How does intellectual property work for NFTs?
- So, how did Green get his kidnapped Ape back?
- What is an NFT wallet, and how can it help?
- How to send NFTs using the Nifty wallet
- Final thoughts
How was Seth Green’s Bored Ape NFT stolen?
Green bought a Bored Ape NFT, #8398, which he named Fred. It is well known that his plans are to use the Bored Ape, which grants licensing rights to the NFT’s owner, to star in his next animated series.
Unfortunately, on May 17th, Green announced that his NFT wallet was compromised in a phishing incident. An outside party obtained his private keys and also stole two Mutant Ape Yacht Club NFTs and a Doodles NFT.
The NFT was promptly transferred on OpenSea to the hackers address, and then onto a user who went by the moniker ‘DarkWing84’.
Despite Green’s attempt to reach out to this user publicly on Twitter, DarkWing84 declined to send back the NFT. It was purchased for 106.5Ξ.
At the time, Seth Green’s NFT was valued at about $200,000.
What is a phishing scam?
We cover phishing scams in cryptocurrency often, and always recommend keeping your private keys safe in an offline environment. We have even developed a specialized NFT wallet for this exact use case.
Phishing scams are one of the most common ways that people have their crypto stolen. In a phishing scam, someone will pose as a legitimate website or person in order to get you to enter your private keys or login information. Once they have your information, they can easily take control of your wallet and steal your funds (or, in this case, NFTs.)
In Green’s case, it’s believed that he clicked on a fake link that led him to a phishing website. Once he entered his login information, the scammers had full access to his wallet and could do whatever they wanted with it.
Phishing scams aren’t exclusive to NFTs, nor are they new. In fact, they’ve been around since the early days of the Internet. If you’ve ever received an email claiming to be from your bank or company, but had a fake email domain attached to it, then it was likely a phishing attempt.
The goal of a phishing scam is to deceive you into thinking you’re interacting with a legitimate website or person. They often use scare tactics or create a sense of urgency to get you to act quickly without thinking.
That’s why it’s important to always take your time and do your research before entering any sensitive information online. If you’re collecting Bored Apes, be sure to keep your private keys safe and away from phishing scammers.
How does intellectual property work for NFTs?
The Bored Ape Yacht Club relinquishes all ownership and licensing rights to the customer once the NFT is sold. This means that any celebrity or collector who buys a Bored Ape NFT can do whatever they want with it, including selling it or even destroying it.
In Green’s case, Fred was set to be the star of his new show: White Horse Tavern. The show follows the premise of a neighborhood tavern bartender who happens to be, you guessed it, an Ape.
As the creator of Robot Chicken, Green is no stranger to innovative ideas in television animation!
From Seth Green’s upcoming NFT show, featuring his Bored Ape NFT (#8398), Fred.
Unfortunately, stolen NFTs are an area of blockchain innovation where there is a legal gray area. While Green was confident he would win in court, there isn’t exact legal precedent for this kind of situation yet.
According to Akiva Cohen, a partner at Kamerman, Uncyk, Soniker & Klein PC, OpenSea transactions are subject to New York law. Cohen says that the thief never obtains ownership, and so all rights to sell or license the intellectual property would have remained with Seth Green.
So, how did Green get his kidnapped Ape back?
Well, he did what many would do in that situation: pleaded, threatened to sue, and then succumbed to the massive ransom request.
Given the lengthy legal implications, and that a teaser trailer had already been released to the public, Green was left with few options! His show seemed to be in jeopardy.
After some back and forth over a period of about 3 weeks, the Bored Ape was returned to him. It cost him 165.005Ξ to get it back.
The NFT has since been transferred back to a wallet labeled ‘Fred_Simian’ where it sits to this day.
While this outcome is suboptimal, our bespoke NFT wallet ‘Nifty’ is built for this use case.
What is an NFT wallet, and how can it help?
An NFT wallet is a cold storage option that safeguards the private keys used to manage your NFTs. While our other crypto wallets are enabled to support fungible and non-fungible assets, the Nifty wallet offers a sleek design and a digital display of each of the NFTs it helps to manage.
While we can’t be certain of which software was used to manage his NFTs, it is overwhelmingly likely that Green was using a software wallet like TrustWallet or Metamask.
How do we know this?
If Green had used a hardware wallet, he would have been prompted to sign the transaction offline in order to authorize the asset transfer. Having this second step separated onto an offline device like the SecuX Nifty makes it all but impossible for unauthorized parties to get their hands on your NFTs!
We strongly recommend that everyone navigating the cryptocurrency space take advantage of this added layer of security. It safeguards your NFTs–and crypto too!
How to send NFTs using the Nifty wallet
SecuX is a leading cryptocurrency hardware wallet company, and we know you’ll love the Nifty wallet’s ‘send NFT’ experience!
Users can now sign their NFT asset transfer transactions manually using their hardware wallet. Peace of mind.
See below for a full tutorial on how to use this feature:
Final thoughts
We could compare NFTs and crypto to the Gold Rush of 1849. It’s exciting, rewarding, and risky all at the same time.
It’s incredibly important to safeguard your assets in such a nascent space. You will sleep better knowing your Bored Apes are secured in a specialized NFT wallet, so contact us with any questions.
In the meantime, we sure are excited to see White Horse Tavern when it debuts in the future. Check out their trailer below!
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