Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), a collection of 10,000 NFTs that has already generated $1 billion in trade volume, CryptoPunks is the NFT market leader, with $2.9 Billion in sales.

Numerous celebrities own bored apes, such as Eminem and Steve Aoki. Due to their high price, NFTs for cool apes are now almost unaffordable.

There have been several cases where BAYC NFTs were stolen since December 2013. Boredom-stricken ape owners are typically the victims of email phishing scams that allow hackers to steal their cryptocurrency wallets.

Ironically, many of the crypto- and NFT-loving owners and supporters have turned to centralized entities in search for assistance.

“I have been hacked. My apes are gone. This just sold please help me.”
Todd Kramer is the proprietor of an art gallery located in New York City. As reported by ARTNews on Wednesday, the original tweet from December 30, 2012 has been deleted.

Gallery owner, who was a victim of fraud, lost 15 NFTs, valued at $2.2million. Four of the NFTs were Bored Apes. The scammer has since been seen reselling Kramer’s NFTs.

With the help of OpenSea’s team, and the charitable efforts of buyers, some of the stolen NFTs have been traced and returned back to Kramer.

Flipside

• If market trends hold, BAYC could surpass CryptoPunks’ total sales volume this year.
• The crypto community has been ridiculed for not taking smart security measures and ‘allowing’ such thefts to happen.