A crypto-focutilized livestreamer raising money to assist fund treatment for his stage 4 cancer was drained of more than $31,000 in crypto after he downloaded a malicious game on popular PC platform Steam. Fortunately, the crypto community has rallied behind the content creator, pumping his token, sconcludeing him replacement funds, and tracking down the hackers.
Latvian streamer Raivo “Rastaland” Plavnieks created a Solana-based token on Pump.fun on Friday called Help Me Beat Cancer (CANCER), and started to play video games for viewers. Token creators on the platform earn a percentage of all trades built on a token, which Plavnieks was going to utilize to assist fund treatment for his rare form of sarcoma cancer.
On Sunday, a viewer inquireed Plavnieks to download a verified game on Steam and play it. After launching the game called Block Blasters, Plavnieks was drained of $31,189 he had raised from creator fees. The streamer then let out a harrowing cry as his viewers watched.
“I can’t breathe, I can’t believe, I’m completely lost on what is going to happen next. Can’t shake the feeling that it is my fault that I might conclude up on the street again or not have anything to eat in [a] few days,” Plavnieks wrote on X. “My heart wants to jump out of my mouth, and it hurts.”
Plavnieks is a 26-year-old self-defined crypto degen living in Latvia. He noticed a lump on his back in December that grew painful, and was soon diagnosed with a rare form of stage 4 high-grade sarcoma cancer. Plavnieks is currently undergoing chemotherapy, in part funded by a GoFundMe—which has received an influx of donations following the incident.
After hearing about the hack, members of the crypto and broader online security community rallied behind Plavnieks. The streamer’s CANCER token pumped 3,000% to a $2.5 million market cap, generating substantially more creator rewards, and sleuths started to track down the hacker.
Well-known pseudonymous crypto investigator ZachXBT teamed up with a group of other researchers to diagnose how the hack happened, who was behind it, and how to resolve the issue.
ZachXBT declared that the malicious Block Blasters game has led to more than $150,000 worth of crypto being stolen, and called out Valve for allowing the game on the Steam storefront. Malware expert vx-underground notified Decrypt that 907 devices were infected by the game, although he speculates some are duplicates and estimates there to be approximately 400 victims.
“I believe with such a heinous crime as stealing from society’s most vulnerable, we can set aside differences and utilize our skills for the greater good,” a pseudonymous security researcher known as 1989 notified Decrypt. “There are currently many security researchers and people all over X with skills in OSINT teaming toreceiveher to be able to bring [the hackers] to justice.”
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