Scammers Hijack Visa, Dean Norris Accounts to Push Fake Solana Tokens

Scammers Hijack Visa, Dean Norris Social Media Accounts to Promote Fake Solana Tokens

Scammers have taken control of Visa and Hollywood actor Dean Norris' social media accounts to promote fake Solana tokens. The incidents have raised concerns about the increasing use of compromised high-profile accounts to execute crypto scams. Visa's Facebook compromise was used to promote a suspicious Solana-based crypto, claiming it was part of Visa's promise to release a crypto token. The attackers wrote, "Remember back in 2014, we said in 11 years we’d have a coin called ‘VISA.’ Well, it’s 2025, and here we are!" However, crypto community members met the announcement with skepticism and warned industry players against it. Critics ridiculed the scammer's choice of Facebook for the scam, suggesting it was unlikely to attract seasoned crypto investors. The token's market cap reportedly surged to $6 million before the attackers orchestrated a rug pull, crashing the price and leaving investors at a loss. Visa has yet to issue any official comment on the incident. Dean Norris' X account was compromised to promote a memecoin named $DEAN. The hackers had shared a digitally altered image of the actor holding a sign featuring the token's name to lend credibility to the scam. Norris debunked the token in a Jan. 26 video, stating that his platform was hacked and urging his followers to disregard the token. He expressed disappointment over the backlash on Reddit and reiterated that he rarely uses social media platforms.

DeepSeek: The New AI Powerhouse - What is it?

On January 20, the Chinese AI startup DeepSeek released its reasoning-oriented open-source model DeepSeek-R1. Over the weekend of January 25-26, the neural network attracted community attention, leading to sell-offs in stock and cryptocurrency markets. DeepSeek is an artificial intelligence startup founded in 2023 in Hangzhou, China. The company specializes in developing large open-source language models and has gained recognition for its innovative approach and achievements. In November, DeepSeek introduced the thinking "super powerful" AI model DeepSeek-R1-Lite-Preview. According to published tests, it performs on par with OpenAI’s o1-preview. At the end of December, the firm showcased its own LLM V3, which surpassed competitors from Meta and Open