Someone has placed a $670 bounty on obtaining information about Elon Musk‘s crypto wallet.
The bounty was introduced on Arkham’s newly-launched “Intel Exchange” platform, which allows users to submit bounties in return for information about blockchain transactions.
The platform, which went live on Monday, aims to engage crypto sleuths in investigating and identifying individuals or entities involved in major crypto thefts.
Arkham has already posted bounties for some major unsolved crypto heists, including the $160 million hack of trading firm Wintermute and the nearly $200 million exploit of Nomad’s token bridge.
The platform’s most prominent bounty is currently a reward of 100,000 Arkham (ARKM) tokens, equivalent to approximately $70,000, on the $415 million stolen from FTX shortly after the company filed for bankruptcy.
Arkham unveiled the Arkham Intel Exchange last week, which it called the world’s first on-chain “intelligence marketplace.”
The marketplace is intended to meet the growing demand for on-chain analysis and create a decentralized intel-to-earn economy, allowing on-chain investigators to earn in exchange for their research.
Arkham’s Intel Marketplace Sparks Privacy Concerns
The launch of Arkham’s intelligence marketplace has sparked privacy and safety concerns in the crypto community.
Some argue that paying to identify and expose crypto users goes against the culture of anonymity that the space values.
There are also concerns about the potential for incentivizing violence and corruption through this platform.
“I’m not a fan of the Arkham update,” Twitter user WickdNFT said.
“What’s to stop bad actors from launching projects only to collect alt wallets and sell that information What’s to stop random employees from x exchange to do the same if bounty is high enough?”
As reported, the platform also faced backlash after it was revealed that the company had leaked its own customers’ private information.
The issue stems from Arkham’s weblink referral program, where users can invite others onto the platform by sharing their unique referral URL.
While these URLs appear to be a random sequence of characters, they are actually an easily decodable version of the user’s email address written in Base64.
This means that anyone who has shared their Arkham link may have unintentionally put their anonymity or, at the very least, their email address at risk.
However, Arkham CEO Miguel Morel has defended the project, stating that the bar for verifying information will be set high.
The company’s website specifies that all information submitted for bounties must be publicly available and cannot include sensitive personal information such as addresses or financial details.
Despite the controversy, Arkham has managed to raise over $10 million in funding rounds, valuing the company at $150 million.
Notable investors include venture capital investor Tim Draper, Bedrock Capital, Wintermute Trading, GSR Markets, and the co-founders of Palantir and OpenAI.
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