Crypto Scams: $500M Lost in Memecoin Rug Pulls, Celebrities Targeted

Crypto investors suffered significant losses in 2024, with over $500 million lost to memecoin rug pulls and scams, according to a report by crypto intelligence platform Merkle Science. The most prevalent method used by scammers was social engineering, involving the impersonation and manipulation of celebrities and tech figures to gain access to their social media accounts.

The report highlights two prominent cases: one involving French footballer Kylian Mbappé, where scammers compromised his X account and promoted a fraudulent memecoin that reached a $460 million market cap before being rug pulled. Another case targeted music artist Wiz Khalifa's 35.7 million followers on X, promoting a fake WIZ token that reached a $3.4 million market cap before plummeting to zero.

Robert Whitaker, director of law enforcement affairs at Merkle Science, stated, "These scams aren’t just opportunistic—they’re highly coordinated operations that exploit trust at scale. Hackers are no longer just breaching wallets or exchanges; they’re hijacking the credibility of celebrities and industry leaders to manipulate markets in real time. Our research shows that meme coin rug pulls alone accounted for hundreds of millions in losses this year, with platforms like X being the primary battleground."

The report reveals that 75% of all attacks took place on X, while 19% occurred on YouTube. Notably, 44% of the reported social engineering scams resulted in rug pulls, and phishing attacks were also attributed to 44% of all scams.