Social media groups dedicated to cryptocurrency in Russia have been attacked by bots in what looks like a campaign against bitcoin and the like. Their comments on Russia’s largest social networking platform were triggered by specific keywords such as crypto and blockchain, as noted by community members.
Bots flood VKontakte groups with anti-cryptocurrency comments
In the past week or so, crypto-themed groups on Russia’s state-controlled social network VKontakte (VK) has seen a growing number of comments seeking to discredit cryptocurrencies and related technologies, crypto news outlets Bits.media and RBC Crypto reported.
Comments appear below linked posts and articles about crypto assets. They are all the same, for example: “It’s more expensive to go into cryptocurrencies, it’s always a big risk”, “Someone is still talking about bitcoins?” or “People who talk about cryptocurrency don’t even understand it.”
According to Nikita Zuborev, senior analyst at the Bestchange.ru exchange aggregator, these bots first appeared on the community of his platform and the official page on VKontakte on February 13th. Accounts are typical of such attacks and have only recently been recorded or hijacked in dormant accounts.
Bots are often used to spread spam and ads or lure users into fraudulent schemes but that is not the case this time. The messages lack external links and their content is limited to abstract cash for cryptocurrency and activities such as trading.
RBC’s VKontakte press service said that the company “does not register an increase in the number of bots on the platform” and emphasized that moderators “instantly respond to complaints” about bots that collectively post the same information.
Zuborev also commented that it is still difficult to say exactly how the bots will react. According to his observations, they ignore posts with images but are energized by those containing words like “Binance”, “bitcoin” or “blockchain”. The analyst pointed out that the attacks escalated this week.
Crypto channels on Telegram are not affected by bot attacks
It is difficult to understand the meaning and effectiveness of such campaigns against cryptocurrencies, as noted by the CEO of the specific banking platform Indefibank, Sergey Mendeleev, because most of the Russian-speaking crypto community does not use this social platform, “for obvious reasons.”
Someone ordered the attacks, Mendeleev believed, so that they could later point out “the large volume of negative comments on the most popular social network.” The expert noted that no such attacks have been seen in crypto channels on Telegram.
VKontakte was founded in 2006 by Russian businessman Pavel Durov who later launched Telegram messenger. In April 2014, Durov was fired as CEO of VK. He indicated that the move was due to his refusal to hand over personal user details to Russian law enforcement agencies, including members of a group dedicated to the Euromaidan protests in Ukraine, and left Russia.
In September of the same year, the Mail.ru Group became the sole owner of the company. In December 2021, Russia’s state-owned bank Gazprombank and insurance company Sogaz bought 57.3% of VK’s shares, becoming owners of its controlling stake. VKontakte recently Launched NFT service.
Who do you think is behind the attacks on cryptocurrency groups on VKontakte? Share your thoughts on the topic in the comments section below.
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