No, Metallica Is Not Giving Away Free Cryptocurrency
Metallica is ending their seven-year hiatus with the release of their new studio album 72 Seasons , due out April 14, 2023. In the midst of the release announcement, fake YouTube videos were circulating online , claiming to be a new interview with the band members promoting their new album, according to a Forbes report. The videos lure fans in with a “download” QR code imprinted on a video that purports to be an unreleased album. But in fact, this is a link to a crypto scam.
What is Metallica Crypto Fraud?
The video promotes a QR code that leads to a crypto site dedicated to Metallica. It asks you to choose Bitcoin or Ethereum as your preferred cryptocurrency and then invites you to the “first Metallica cryptocurrency giveaway”. Except that there is none. The scammer asks you to enter the draw by spending a small amount of bitcoins and says that you will “immediately receive double the amount back.” Unfortunately, there are already reports of victims who have lost around $25,000 in Bitcoin due to the scam.
The video shared the same logo and channel name as the original Metallica channel . He even has a decent number of subscribers (19.1k at the time of writing), but far from 9.21m on the official channel.
YouTube usernames are unique, but channel names can be used by multiple people. The bad username was actually “@Memetallica” instead of @Metallica and the “live” video of the interview misled people when it’s actually an old press interview due to the COVID lockdown.
In general, major events are often targeted by scammers who pretend to offer gifts or discounted tickets. Always look out for artfully misspelled usernames and clever puns, and check with official accounts to make sure what’s being promoted is indeed real.