Loading cryptocurrency prices...

Apriori Airdrop Faces Sybil Attack by 5,800 Wallets Pre-Launch

  • A high concentration of Apriori’s airdropped tokens was claimed by a cluster of 5,800 wallets showing suspicious behavior.
  • The wallets were prepared days before Apriori publicly announced the airdrop’s eligibility and blockchain.
  • About 80% of tokens on BNB Chain went to this single group, suggesting a large-scale Sybil attack.
  • Apriori’s APR token market value dropped 60% shortly after the airdrop on October 23.
  • Apriori did not comment on the suspicious token claim activity linked to the recent airdrop.

On October 23, Apriori, a trading infrastructure startup backed by Binance founder Changpeng Zhao’s venture firm, executed a token airdrop to distribute its APR token to its community and contributors. However, onchain data revealed suspicious activity involving a cluster of over 5,800 wallets claiming about 80% of the tokens on BNB Chain.

- Advertisement -

Analysis reviewed by DL News suggests these wallets formed an industrial-scale Sybil attack, where many wallets controlled by one entity claim airdrops multiple times. The wallets were funded with small amounts of BNB between October 19 and 20 to cover transaction fees, notably days before Apriori announced on October 22 that the airdrop would occur on Ethereum and BNB Chain instead of the initially expected Monad blockchain.

All clustered wallets received BNB from the same 13 wallets weeks before the airdrop, but ownership of those remains unknown. The wallets became eligible by purchasing Apriori’s testnet tokens on Monad in early October, although these testnet tokens have no real value. The eligibility criteria for the airdrop, however, were publicly revealed only on October 22.

Apriori’s APR token has seen its market value fall by 60% from its all-time high recorded on October 23, trading at approximately $93 million according to CoinGecko. The startup’s team includes former engineers from Jump Trading, Coinbase, and Citadel Securities, having raised $30 million from venture firms such as YZi Labs (formerly Binance Labs), HashKey Capital, Pantera Capital, and Primitive Ventures.

The company has connections to the upcoming Ethereum-compatible Monad blockchain and is developing a liquid staking platform on its testnet. Apriori and its founder, Ray Song, have not responded to requests for comment on the suspicious airdrop activity. Other investors also declined to comment.

- Advertisement -

✅ Follow BITNEWSBOT on Telegram, Facebook, LinkedIn, X.com, and Google News for instant updates.

Previous Articles:

- Advertisement -

Latest News

CoinShares Drops SEC Solana ETF; KuCoin Gains EU MiCA License

CoinShares has withdrawn its SEC application for a staked Solana ETF after the underlying...

OpenAI API User Data Exposed in Mixpanel Breach, No Keys Leaked

An attacker accessed part of Mixpanel’s systems on November 8 and exported customer-identifiable metadata.Data...

North Korean Hackers Flood npm with 197 Malicious Packages

North Korean Hackers have released 197 malicious packages on the npm registry since last...

Strategy (MSTR) Again Rejected from S&P 500, SanDisk Chosen Instead

Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) was not added to the S&P 500 index in the latest...

CME Halts Trading 10 Hours Over Data Center Cooling Issue

Chicago Mercantile Exchange halted trading for about 10 hours due to a cooling system...
- Advertisement -

Must Read

How to Buy VPN With Bitcoin Using CyberGhost VPN

In this step-by-step guide, you will learn how to purchase a VPN (Virtual Private Network) subscription using Bitcoin, a popular cryptocurrency, and CyberGhost VPN,...