Sparkster ICO Phishing

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Sparkster

Sparkster was a platform claiming to make code development significantly easier, by abstracting away all the complex technical layers behind the scenes. The platform launched an ICO, and was the subject of a phishing attack at the time, as reported by Kaspersky. It's unknown what, if anything, was lost. Investors were subsequently contemplating a lawsuit on an unrelated matter.

This is a global/international case not involving a specific country.

About Sparkster

"Sparkster is empowering you to bring your ideas to reality by enabling you to build software without writing code. Then run that software on the Sparkster Decentralized Cloud, a specialized blockchain that can support more than 10 Million TPS."

"What if Decentralized Software could be built by anyone in Plain English, without knowledge of programming or blockchain architecture? That's the Sparkster Platform."

"What if this Smart Software could run at 10 Million TPS? That's the Sparkster Decentralized Cloud. We're accelerating blockchain adoption, and want you to join our revolution."

"The Next Generation Sparkster Decentralized Cloud meets the needs of widespread Blockchain adoption by supporting millions of customers and processing tens of millions of transactions per second ON CHAIN! Sparkster Decentralized Cloud is architected to support millions of customers, and hence, support mainstream blockchain adoption."

"We believe software skills are a human right, as important as reading, writing, and math."

"Apps are how we solve problems, build companies, and express our creativity. And in our fast-moving, automated world, they are the new official language of prosperity. But too many of us are left out, lacking the skills or expensive education to know the first thing about creating software."

"Our mission is to change that. You deserve the opportunity to help build the future. Because when you succeed, we all succeed."

"In the second quarter, our antiphishing system prevented 58,000 user attempts to connect to phishing websites masquerading as popular cryptocurrency wallets and markets. In addition to classic phishing, which aims at gaining access to the victim’s accounts and private key information, cybercriminals try every way to entice a victim to willingly send them cryptocurrency. One of the examples of this are cryptocoin giveaways. Cybercriminals continue using the names of new ICO projects to collect money from potential investors that are trying to gain early access to new tokens. Sometimes phishing sites pop up before official project sites."

"Fake ICO projects: the first page is located on the domain fantom.pub and mimics fantom.foundation, the real site of the FANTOM project; the second—hosted on sparkster.be—is a fake version of sparkster.me, the website of the SPARKSTER project."

"Sparkster (SPRK) raised $30M in its initial coin offering (ICO), which concluded in July 2018. Investors are now threatening legal action against the project, alleging that founders purposely misled investors during the sale, with promises of returns as high as 300 times their initial investments. The Telegram handle highlighted in the image below is used by a Sparkster admin who describes himself as the CEO."

"One of the unhappy parties is CryptoArnie, a London-based crypto personality. He explained investors became increasingly worried by the project’s lack of communication."

“I know one person who invested $150,000, and another who put $25,000 into Sparkster,” Arnie said on the phone. “Now the team’s gone AWOL and people are calling for action.”

"Sparkster has denied any allegations of wrongdoing. Daya has said he has been unable to communicate with investors because his mother is in a “critical condition” in hospital."

This is a global/international case not involving a specific country.

The background of the exchange platform, service, or individuals involved, as it would have been seen or understood at the time of the events.

Include:

• Known history of when and how the service was started.
• What problems does the company or service claim to solve?
• What marketing materials were used by the firm or business?
• Audits performed, and excerpts that may have been included.
• Business registration documents shown (fake or legitimate).
• How were people recruited to participate?
• Public warnings and announcements prior to the event.

Don't Include:

• Any wording which directly states or implies that the business is/was illegitimate, or that a vulnerability existed.
• Anything that wasn't reasonably knowable at the time of the event.

There could be more than one section here. If the same platform is involved with multiple incidents, then it can be linked to a main article page.

The Reality

This sections is included if a case involved deception or information that was unknown at the time. Examples include:

• When the service was actually started (if different than the "official story").
• Who actually ran a service and their own personal history.
• How the service was structured behind the scenes. (For example, there was no "trading bot".)
• Details of what audits reported and how vulnerabilities were missed during auditing.

What Happened

The specific events of the loss and how it came about. What actually happened to cause the loss and some of the events leading up to it.

Key Event Timeline - Sparkster ICO Phishing

Date	Event	Description
August 14th, 2018	Main Event	Expand this into a brief description of what happened and the impact. If multiple lines are necessary, add them here.

Technical Details

This section includes specific detailed technical analysis of any security breaches which happened. What specific software vulnerabilities contributed to the problem and how were they exploited?

Total Amount Lost

The total amount at risk has been estimated at $30,000,000 USD. The total amount lost is unknown.

How much was lost and how was it calculated? If there are conflicting reports, which are accurate and where does the discrepancy lie?

Immediate Reactions

How did the various parties involved (firm, platform, management, and/or affected individual(s)) deal with the events? Were services shut down? Were announcements made? Were groups formed?

Ultimate Outcome

What was the end result? Was any investigation done? Were any individuals prosecuted? Was there a lawsuit? Was any tracing done?

Total Amount Recovered

There do not appear to have been any funds recovered in this case.

What funds were recovered? What funds were reimbursed for those affected users?

Ongoing Developments

What parts of this case are still remaining to be concluded?

Individual Prevention Policies

No specific policies for individual prevention have yet been identified in this case.

For the full list of how to protect your funds as an individual, check our Prevention Policies for Individuals guide.

Platform Prevention Policies

Policies for platforms to take to prevent this situation have not yet been selected in this case.

For the full list of how to protect your funds as a financial service, check our Prevention Policies for Platforms guide.

Regulatory Prevention Policies

No specific regulatory policies have yet been identified in this case.

For the full list of regulatory policies that can prevent loss, check our Prevention Policies for Regulators guide.