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Rampant scams within the NFT space have inspired the Little Shapes project founder to conduct a social experiment to expose NFT botnets and their influence on the market. Over a period of one year, the founder, who goes by the name Atto, studied how Twitter botnets combined with various influencers to rug pull over $200 million from unsuspecting investors. The findings are detailed in a 158-page document.
To achieve his intended goal, Atto started the Little Shapes NFT project and began using its Twitter account to post sensationalized messages that would attract attention. Speaking to a popular news outlet, he notes that “people don’t pay attention unless you give them a reason to.” Thus, he “needed a story that sells to make sure no one would ignore a story that hurts.”
For example, in one post, he reveals that he just woke up from a five-month coma only to find out his wife was cheating on him, and to make matters worse, he had assets locked on FTX. Then he tapped into NFT botnets such as “Dmister,” a bot network that sells social media engagement, to promote the project. The details on how the process works are also outlined in the document.
Hey Little Shapes fam, this might sound crazy but I got into a car accident 5 months ago and just got out of a huge coma. I don’t know what’s been going on since then but we’re coming back harder than ever.
You’re only on the start, of the Little Shapes journey <3 pic.twitter.com/rOEEHq0kVN
— Little Shapes NFT (BALLZ) (@LittleShapesNFT) December 28, 2022
The bot network charges NFT projects only $100 for 1,000 likes, retweets, and replies. Once a project builds enough hype to attract actual investors, they “get rug-pulled or fucked over, usually in the course of a few months.” The individuals behind the scam project end up making $3 to $4 million.
Over 274 Scam Projects Have Utilized NFT Botnets To Build Hype And Rug Pull Investors
During the span of his research, he was able to discover about 274 projects that scammed over $200 million from investors. What bothered him the most was the fact that “we seem to be in a space ranked completely by social capital and fake Twitter engagement where nothing is real.”
Even though Little Shapes as an NFT project was fake, the exposé is real. In a tweet made on Feb. 2, Atto thanks his 30,800 followers and shares a link to the document. Also, he has launched BALLZNFT, which appears to be a genuine project, with its first mint taking place a day after the exposé. It features token artwork that depicts references to the Little Shapes performance.
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*All investment/financial opinions expressed by NFT Plazas are from the personal research and experience of our site moderators and are intended as educational material only. Individuals are required to fully research any product prior to making any kind of investment.
Basil is an avid fan of blockchain technology and all its innovations, and he is passionate about sharing this narrative with his audience. He has spent over five years in the crypto space, specializing in research and creating Web3 content for various media outlets around the globe.
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