Twitter Account Hack Leads to Fake News and Costly Losses in the Crypto Market
In a dramatic turn of events, the popular crypto influencer @tier10k found their Twitter account hacked.
The hacker took advantage of this influencer’s significant following in order to announce a series of unfounded claims that sent the cryptocurrency market into a tizzy.
Most of the falsehoods being propagated via @tier10k’s account concerned the $TRUMP token, a cryptocurrency backed by the Donald Trump swaps and the entire Trump family. The truth of those claims was already sufficiently in doubt that the token’s price, which just a few hours earlier had been hovering around 1 cent, was by then falling back down to about the same position it had traded in before this whole fiasco began.
The Fake News and Its Immediate Impact on $TRUMP
The chaos started when the hacked @tier10k account spread false information saying that $TRUMP, a not-so-well-known cryptocurrency, had landed a big utility partnership. It was a completely made-up story, but it made a few people rich in the very short term and caused the value of the token to go zooming up right after the tweet was posted. And by zooming up, I mean we saw a 20% surge in the price of $TRUMP, with a bunch of investors running in to scoop it up before it was too late.
π¨ π¨ HACK ALERT π¨π¨@tier10k X account seems to have been compromised.
ππ’ π‘π’π§ πππππ π’π‘ ππ‘π¬ πππ‘ππ¦ π£π’π¦π§ππ π§πππ₯π!
Stay Alert π
Stay Safe π‘ pic.twitter.com/ErYHqL0m9X— Harpie (@harpieio) March 13, 2025
The rally, however, did not last for long. A few minutes after the tweet, a second bogus announcement was made from the same hacked account, stating that $TRUMP would be entering the big leagues and would soon be listed on a major Exchange-Traded Fund (ETF). This sent the token’s price up 6%, yet again (when will these people learn that scam tokens don’t have long-term upside?) as traders thought they were now on the right side of an emerging trend. But this was just a temporary spike among many in this token’s short life.
After it was established that both declarations were completely unfounded, the value of the $TRUMP token dived to where it had been before, taking with it a number of investors who were sure they were buying in at the right time. In what some have called a “pump-and-dump” scheme, the hackers used media hysteria to create a buying panic, then watched as the price zoomed up, before they jettisoned a bunch of tokens right before the price zoomed back down.
Opportunistic Trader Caught in the Falsified Hype
With the wildfire spread of the fake news, an opportunistic trader decided to take advantage of the sudden market volatility. Seeing the rapid price movements of $TRUMP, the trader quickly set up a new wallet and withdrew 504,820 $USDC from Binance, a major cryptocurrency exchange. The funds were then used to purchase a substantial amount of $TRUMP, likely in the hopes of profiting from the bullish sentiment created by the fraudulent announcements.
Please be cautious with market news and always verify its accuracy before trading.
After the hacked @tier10k account spread false information about $TRUMP, someone quickly created a new wallet and withdrew 504,820 $USDC from #Binance to buy $TRUMP.
Once the news was confirmed⦠pic.twitter.com/XvJb11zexQ
— Lookonchain (@lookonchain) March 13, 2025
For a brief moment, it seemed as if the trader’s decision was a good one. Yet, as soon as the news was confirmed untrue, the value of $TRUMP tanked. When the news broke, the trader had $TRUMP, but they had to quickly turn it into cash.
To make matters worse, the trader took a 26,820 $USDC loss on that direct tradeβtrading basically amounts to trying to go with the market trend, whether it’s up or down. You’re a buyer in a bull market, and if you’re not careful, a great loser in a bear market.
Investors should be wary of the spread of misinformation in the crypto market, and the fate of $TRUMP shows why. Misinformation can move markets, and the consequences of trading on the basis of it can be severe. In this case, a trader bought into the hype with lightning speed. When it was over, the rapidity of the hype seemed to almost necessitate a reverse-hype moment; thus, $TRUMP fell. The altcoin is a tale of caution.
The Impact of Social Media on Cryptocurrency Markets
This incident is not the first time that social media has played a pivotal role in affecting cryptocurrency valuations. Platforms like Twitter, Reddit, and Telegram have become the core of gossip, conjecture, and sometimes misinformation. The hacking of @tier10k serves as a reminder of how easily and quickly false information can spreadβand how rapidly it can influence prices, especially in the highly volatile cryptocurrency market.
How quickly the fake news moved and made the prices swing shows very clearly that the information needs to be verified before taking action, especially in such an emergent market as crypto. This is a cautionary tale for investors and traders when it comes to interpreting sudden market moves that are heavily driven by social media. If market actors can push a malicious narrative that makes the prices swing, then everybody involved has to take a step back and think about security and the integrity of the information system since the system clearly isn’t working.
Moving Forward: Lessons from the Incident
The lessons learned from this hack and the disturbance it caused in the cryptocurrency market are very important for those who trade in this space. Because the cryptocurrency market is so volatile, swinging one way or another in a very short period, it is crucial to verify information before making a trade. Most market participants seem to have known this, but the events of this day underscore it even more. Relying on social media or other public platforms for information can be a recipe for disaster.
The incident also raises issues of safety for the platforms involved, like Twitter and Binance, and highlights the need for them to implement heightened protections for their most prominent users. One way to accomplish that might be through better verification methods that are more difficult to circumvent, which could also make the accounts in question harder to hack.
In conclusion, everything that happened serves as a reminder of the risks one runs when trading on hype and speculation instead of trading on solid fundamentals. The opportunities for quick profits in a highly volatile market are enticing. But if $TRUMP taught us anything, itβs that we have to be on our guard against not just the market itself but also the market’s manipulators if we want to avoid suffering big losses.
Conclusion: A Wake-Up Call for Crypto Traders
The @tier10k account was hacked, and false information about the $TRUMP token was spread. This incident demonstrates how powerful “information” is (or isn’t) in the cryptocurrency market.
It shows that even when the market is (or should be) rational, participants can be influenced on a level most of us would prefer to think in terms of human psychology, not actual information!
In the case of the $TRUMP token, false news spread, using a “trusted” account, in a way that most likely keyed some number of participants to act, which in turn made the $TRUMP token appear more valuable than it was (or perhaps less valuable than it had seemed just before all this happened).
Disclosure: This is not trading or investment advice. Always do your research before buying any Metaverse crypto coins.
