Crypto sleuth ZachXBT recently made a discovery regarding Coinbase user losing over 400 Bitcoins worth $33.5 million in present-day cryptocurrency value through social media engineering attacks.
ZachXBT observed on his Telegram channel that superior cyber threats against major cryptocurrency exchanges have seen a surge in Q1 of 2025, especially after March 16.
As per Zach, the wallet address bc1qvl serves as the main mechanism to carry out the illicit transfers that have been linked to the thefts according to official investigation findings. The theft of Bitcoin resulted in a transfer from the Bitcoin blockchain to the Ethereum blockchain through the combination of THORChain and Chainflip bridge tools, which worsened the situation.
ZachXBT identified a Coinbase user who lost 400 bitcoin worth over $33.5 million at the current prices after multiple social engineering attacks targeted the U.S.-based cryptocurrency exchange users.
THORChain and Chainflip bridge tools enabled the bitcoin theft to be transferred from Bitcoin’s blockchain to Ethereum’s blockchain, ZachXBT reported.
During his investigation, the sleuth came across numerous other Coinbase user thefts and mentions on Telegram since the first two weeks of March, which resulted in $46M+ worth of stolen assets. ZachXBT issued notifications about Coinbase user attacks during the previous months. During last year, scammers defrauded a Gemini creditor out of $234 million worth of bitcoin by pretending to be Coinbase support agents. Three suspects faced police arrest in Miami through investigative data from ZachXBT.
According to the investigator’s reports, criminals successfully duped Coinbase users to rob them of $65 million across December 2024 and January 2025.
The data shows that Coinbase failed to identify any of the victim addresses in their compliance programs following these March-based attacks.
The growing dangers in the cryptocurrency space require users to stay updated about new risks. To protect their crypto assets, users need to stay alert against constantly developing social engineering deception methods.
Also read : CRO is no different from a scam: ZachXBT
