Fake AI Crypto Arbitrage Bot YouTube Campaign (2026)
Auto-generated score, not yet verified against the scoring model. Under review — treat as indicative, not a verdict.
Summary
Between February and August 2026, a coordinated campaign of nine YouTube tutorials falsely claimed to teach viewers how to build AI-powered crypto arbitrage bots using Anthropic's Claude. According to blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs, the tutorials directed victims to a fake code compiler mimicking the Remix IDE; when victims deployed the supplied contracts and pressed Start or Withdraw, all wallet balances above 0.05 ETH were silently forwarded to attacker-controlled addresses. TRM Labs attributed losses of 274.60 ETH (approximately $517,000) across 224 victims, with all nine videos remaining live and accumulating over 310,000 combined views as of September 2026.
Connected Entities
1 entityNo connected entities recorded yet — this investigation is not currently linked to any other page in the index.
Timeline(5 events)
1 January 2025
A prior iteration of the same campaign allegedly ran using ChatGPT branding, according to TRM Labs. Exact dates within 2025 were not specified in available reporting.
TRM Labs research blog12 February 2026
First identified malicious contract deployment in the 2026 Claude-branded campaign, per TRM Labs on-chain analysis.
TRM Labs research blog11 August 2026
Last identified malicious contract deployment in the campaign period analyzed by TRM Labs.
TRM Labs research blog18 September 2026
TRM Labs published findings; reporting by Crypto Briefing, CoinSpectator, PA News, and others confirmed 224 victims, 274.60 ETH stolen, and 310,474 combined YouTube views across nine live tutorials.
Crypto Briefing / CoinSpectator22 September 2026
AirdropAlert published secondary coverage; all nine YouTube videos reported still live.
AirdropAlertDecision Log
- #1publishNot recorded (failed)10/8/2026, 11:04:09 PMhash 64h8VhN3WBx9ftZDaJwusxXGbdvkojf3orcyvnAR3DN1
model: claude-sonnet-4-6
generated: 10/8/2026, 11:04:03 PM
last updated: 10/9/2026, 12:59:34 AM
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