His tone was almost broken, with the screen full of wails:
"I just asked her to click transfer, and the result was the wallet was emptied..."
In his wallet, there was originally 2.3 million USDT.
This was all his savings after years of struggling in the crypto world.
The incident started with just a temporary transfer.
On that day, he was on a business trip in another city and temporarily needed to transfer some funds, so he asked his wife to help.
He said: 'I'll send you the mnemonic phrase via WeChat, you copy and paste it to log into the wallet, and just transfer the coins to the address I mention.'
His wife did as instructed, and a few minutes later replied: 'I transferred it.'
But when he got off the plane and checked, all the coins in the wallet were gone.
It wasn't a wrong address, nor a human error, but rather— the wallet was completely hacked.
The truth behind it: a huge security loophole
After investigation, the problem lay in the following several aspects:
He sent a screenshot of the mnemonic phrase to his wife via WeChat
She used an old Android phone to operate
That phone had previously installed: browser acceleration plugins, financial apps, domestic financial tools
Among these seemingly harmless applications, there are actually hidden hacker backdoors:
Once a mnemonic phrase format is detected in the clipboard
It is immediately uploaded to a remote server, allowing hackers to control the wallet directly without waiting for the transfer operation
In other words, it wasn't that she transferred incorrectly, but that as soon as she opened the wallet, the hacker 'took over'.
She looked confused: 'I really didn't click transfer.'
He was silent for a long time and only said one sentence:
"It's not her fault, it's my lack of thorough consideration."
Why you should be wary of this 'family assistance operation'
No way to report: the police treat it as a family misoperation, handling it as a civil dispute
Assets are beyond rescue: on-chain transfers are irreversible, and funds being cleared are nearly unsolvable
The psychological blow is great: not only financial loss, but also a hit to familial love and trust
Hacker tactics upgraded: instead of waiting for you to transfer, they directly empty your assets with one click
Lesson summary: Don't make these 'basic mistakes' again
Do not transmit mnemonic phrase screenshots via WeChat/QQ, even to family members
Do not log into the wallet using phones that have installed accelerators, VPNs, or financial apps
Without professionally isolated devices, do not let family members operate hot wallets
Do not perform any actions involving mnemonic phrases on old Android models
Safety reminder:
The crypto market is getting colder, not because there are no opportunities, but because more and more people are afraid.
It's not that your skills are lacking, it's that you handed over the key to life and death to an unprotected device.
It's not that you trusted the wrong person, but that you didn't implement risk isolation.
