RiskOnBlast suspected to be first rug pull on Blast after $1M presale

RiskOnBlast suspected to be first rug pull on Blast after M presale
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The RiskOnBlast project, a gambling platform based on the Blast layer-2 ecosystem, is suspected of being the first rug pull on Blast following the disappearance of its funds, website and social media presence.

According to Arkham Intelligence, RiskOnBlast balances have gone to zero after the funds appeared to have been siphoned out on Feb. 25.

The GambleFi project had raised 420 Ether (ETH) worth $1.25 million for a presale token called RISK, which began on Feb. 22 and ended the following day. However, the team has since moved funds in batches of Dai (DAI) to ChangeNOW, a noncustodial crypto exchange.

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Transactions from RiskOnBlast address. Source: Arkham Intelligence

Moreover, Etherscan has flagged the project’s address as a phishing scam, urging users to “exercise caution when interacting with it.”

Coinbase tech lead Andrew Choi was among those who posted an alert warning that the project’s website and social media presence had disappeared on Feb. 25.

On Feb. 25, blockchain sleuth Amir Ormu reported that the RiskOnBlast team had washed $850,000 of the stolen funds using ChangeNOW as a mixer to obfuscate the transaction trail. Funds were also sent to the MEXC and Bybit exchanges.

The crypto community has since rallied to help track down the funds following the alleged rug pull. One of the victims of the rug pull who lost $12,500, nonfungible token investor “MoonCat2878,” donated 1 ETH to blockchain sleuth ZachXBT, who has previously worked at tracking down and recovering stolen crypto.

Another victim has also reported losses to the tune of $10,000. 

RiskOnBlast was announced by the Blast team on Feb. 12, according to screenshots shared by users. Red flags were raised by the small three-person team behind the gambling project, whose identities were not made public.

Cointelegraph reached out to Blast for comment but did not receive an immediate response. 

Related: How scammers used FOMO and misleading code to rug 42K victims

The Blast protocol is a scaling solution for the Ethereum network, providing native yields to users who stake their funds. It was announced in mid-November and has since accrued $2 billion in total value, locked largely from airdrop hunters since the platform promised an airdrop in May.

However, the platform has been plagued with some bugs and controversy in the months following its announcement.

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