YouTube Turned into a Fraud Tool
Once innocent and forgotten YouTube accounts have become a powerful weapon in the hands of cybercriminals. Researchers at SentinelLABS are warning of a sophisticated and persistent campaign that uses these aged accounts to promote fake crypto trading bots. Disguised as profitable video tutorials, these scams actually lure users into deploying malicious smart contracts — with one goal: drain their wallets.
According to lead threat researcher Alex Delamotte, this is a widespread and ongoing threat targeting hopeful investors looking for profitable tools.
How Does the Scam Work?
At first glance, everything seems legit: the videos feature high-quality visuals, AI-generated narrators, and convincing explanations that entice viewers to deploy so-called arbitrage bots or MEV (Maximal Extractable Value) tools.
🔹 Users are redirected to a website that provides the source code of a “smart contract.”
🔹 They are instructed to deploy it via platforms like Remix, a common Ethereum development environment.
🔹 The promise? Easy passive income and arbitrage profits.
In reality, the smart contract is rigged to secretly include the attacker’s wallet address. It uses various obfuscation techniques — XOR operations, string concatenation, or hexadecimal address generation — to hide its true purpose from plain sight.
Once the user deploys the contract and sends at least 0.5 ETH (allegedly to cover gas fees), the contract’s internal logic activates and allows the attacker to instantly steal the funds. In some cases, the attack is triggered automatically, even if the user doesn't explicitly interact with the contract afterward.
A Profitable Fraud Scheme
SentinelLABS identified several scam-linked wallets, with one standing out in particular. The address associated with YouTube user @Jazz_Braze received 244.9 ETH, worth over $900,000.
The stolen funds were quickly moved through more than 20 secondary wallets, pointing to a sophisticated money laundering operation.
Old Accounts, New Threat
The YouTube channels used in the scam weren’t newly created — many previously hosted videos related to crypto or pop culture. Delamotte notes that these accounts were likely purchased through Telegram groups or other black-market platforms.
The age and prior content give these accounts a false sense of trust and credibility. Many videos feature AI-generated positive comments, while negative feedback is heavily moderated or removed altogether.
What Are Crypto Trading Bots and MEV?
Crypto trading bots are legitimate tools that automate trades using predefined strategies. They can track market trends, detect price inefficiencies, and execute orders much faster than a human trader.
A special category is MEV bots, which scan blockchain mempools (pending transactions) to exploit transaction ordering for profit.
Fun fact: A bot known as arsc once used such strategies to extract nearly $30 million from unsuspecting Solana users using “sandwich attacks” — inserting its own transactions before and after a target trade.
A Clear Warning for Crypto Investors
SentinelLABS is urging all crypto traders and investors:
Never deploy code from social media videos or influencer tutorials, no matter how promising they seem.
As Delamotte bluntly puts it:
"If something sounds too good to be true, it usually is — especially in crypto."
60-Second Summary:
🔹 Scammers exploit old YouTube accounts to spread fake crypto bots
🔹 Users are tricked into deploying malicious code that drains their wallets
🔹 One scammer wallet collected over $900,000 in ETH
🔹 MEV bots are real but can be misused for attacks
🔹 Always verify sources — extreme caution is a must in the crypto space
#Cryptoscam , #YouTube , #CryptoFraud , #defi , #Web3Security
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