Fake ‘ClawdBot’ AI Token Hits $16M Before 90% Crash — Founder Warns of Scam
The founder of the open-source AI assistant ClawdBot, now renamed Moltbot, has issued a public warning to the crypto group after scammers launched faux tokens utilizing his mission’s title, drawing in merchants and triggering sharp losses.
Peter Steinberger stated he has by no means issued a token, has no plans to take action, and has no connection to any cryptocurrency claiming affiliation along with his work.
The faux token, $CLAWD, briefly gained traction amongst retail merchants on Solana-based meme coin platforms, reaching an early market capitalization of round $16 million.
Momentum was short-lived; as quickly as Steinberger publicly denied involvement, the market cap plunged from roughly $8 million to beneath $800,000.
Steinberger made the assertion after days of being contacted by crypto merchants and promoters following the sudden look of meme cash branded round “ClawdBot.”
Founder Says Token Activity Is Hurting Software Project
In a publish on X, he asked buyers to cease contacting him and likewise said that he wouldn’t take any charges or endorsements associated to crypto launches.
This warning was issued as a result of emergence of the impersonation accounts that had been advertising a token known as $CLAWD, which was displayed on Solana-based meme coin platforms.
The token briefly gained traction amongst retail merchants, with some reporting early positive factors as hype unfold throughout social media.
Traders posted on X that the incident was one other occasion of speculative AI-related tokens falling as quickly as official dismissal was introduced.
Several customers accused the nameless token deployers of serial rug-pull conduct, claiming related tasks had been launched and deserted beneath totally different names.
The state of affairs was compounded by a naming transition underway on the time. Steinberger said the ClawdBot mission was compelled to rebrand to Moltbot following trademark points.
During the renaming course of, errors with account migrations allowed third events to squat on or take management of associated GitHub and X handles.
Those accounts had been then used to impersonate the mission and promote crypto tokens as in the event that they had been formally linked.
Steinberger stated he’s working with GitHub to get well the affected accounts and urged customers to disregard any crypto-related claims tied to the mission.
ClawdBot, now Moltbot, gained consideration earlier this month after going viral amongst builders.
The instrument is an open-source, self-hosted AI assistant designed to run domestically on a consumer’s machine and combine with messaging platforms reminiscent of Telegram, WhatsApp, Discord, and Slack.
Unlike web-based chatbots, it’s designed to retain long-term reminiscence, execute instructions, and automate duties straight on the consumer’s system.
Steinberger, who beforehand sold software program firm PSPDFKit for about €100 million, returned to growth to construct the mission as a privacy-focused various to cloud-hosted AI instruments.
At the identical time, cybersecurity researchers have raised issues about unsafe deployments of ClawdBot by customers unfamiliar with server safety.
Blockchain safety agency SlowMist and impartial researchers reported that tons of of ClawdBot gateway situations had been uncovered to the general public web because of misconfigured proxies.
These setups doubtlessly allowed entry to API keys, chat logs, and command execution capabilities.
Researchers stressed that the problem stemmed from consumer configuration errors moderately than a hidden exploit however warned that the dangers had been critical given the instrument’s deep system entry.
Those safety warnings added to confusion as scammers used the mission’s sudden visibility to market tokens to speculative merchants.
The publish Fake ‘ClawdBot’ AI Token Hits $16M Before 90% Crash — Founder Warns of Scam appeared first on Cryptonews.

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