Many Ethereum enthusiasts follow Vitalik Buterin on Twitter. That is only normal, as he is the most public figure when it comes to talking about Ethereum. Moreover, he is also responsible for a fair amount of coding work going into this project. But there is a fake Vitalik Buterin profile on Twitter, which is spamming malicious links.
Will The Real Vitalik Please Stand Up?
It is not hard to see who the real Vitalik is or isn’t on Twitter, though. The fake account uses the VitalikButiren handle, which is only slightly different, but rather obvious for anyone who knows what to look for. That is one of the downsides of being somewhat famous on the Internet, as there will be impersonation attempts sooner or later.
Another giveaway of this account being fake is how the Twitter account was registered in February of 2016. While it may use the same profile picture as the real account, there are not too many correlations otherwise. What is more worrisome, however, is how this account has over 4,350 followers right now.
Glancing over the fake account’s Twitter feed, there are no real malicious links to be found. The tone of content is very different from the real account, though, which is another giveaway for people who have been following the legitimate account for some time. Some Reddit users report this fake account approaching them to “buy Ethereum at a discount”, though.
The best course of action is to report this fake Twitter account as soon as possible. It will take some time before the social media platform takes action against this impersonation, though. Then again, incidents like these need to be reported to the proper channels, as that will usually yield the best results.
Luckily, no real harm has been done by this fake Vitalik profile so far. There have been no reports of any users being scammed or losing money, albeit some people may be rather hesitant to report their own mistakes. Always do your own research online, as there are plenty of people will try to steal your money at some point.
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