A Cautionary Tale: Crypto Influencer Loses $60,000 in Live Stream Blunder

Ivan Bianco, a Brazilian YouTuber who focuses on blockchain gaming through his channel Fraternidade Crypto, recently suffered a significant loss when close to $60,000 in cryptocurrency and several NFTs were stolen from him. The incident happened when he inadvertently showed his crypto wallets’ seed phrases during a livestream. His channel has about 34,000 YouTube subscribers and has garnered over 2.2 million views since its inception in 2017.

In a follow-up livestream, an emotional Bianco recounted the events to his audience, explaining that he attempted to secure a new wallet as soon as he noticed his mistake. However, by then, his cryptocurrency had already been pilfered from two of his wallets within minutes.

Bianco disclosed that 86,600 MATIC tokens, worth about $50,800, were stolen from his Polygon wallet. Additionally, around 3.35 ETH ($5,750) was taken and is now in another person’s Arbitrum wallet. Smaller crypto amounts were also allegedly stolen by others. Confirming to Decrypt via email, Bianco said that he had lost roughly $60,000 in total, along with several NFTs, and had filed a police report regarding the incident.

“The police aren’t very knowledgeable about this, so it might take a while,” he mentioned, adding that he would need to lead the recovery efforts with the support of his online community.

In a surprising turn of events, the individual who took the majority of the stolen funds reached out to Bianco on Discord, expressing remorse for his actions. Following the call, the MATIC tokens were returned to Bianco, who verified to Decrypt that about $50,000 worth of the stolen cryptocurrency was given back. While some fans questioned the authenticity of these events, Bianco firmly denied any skepticism.

“The person just decided to return the funds for some reason, I didn’t do anything to get it back,” he said. He also mentioned that he knows the identity of the person but chose not to reveal it, stating, “There’s no reason for me to screw him over, even though what he did was wrong.”

As for the other alleged thieves, Bianco warned that they “are being tracked and will be located.” He hopes that the footage of the incident will serve as a cautionary tale, urging others to be more careful with their crypto assets.