Gab returned online after the social media network popular with right-wing users took itself down to resolve a bitcoin scam.
CEO Andrew Torba said in a Friday blog post that after many accounts “were uploading bitcoin wallet spam and related content,” Gab took himself offline. Less than 20 accounts were impacted and no bitcoin was transferred, Torba said.
“We have identified and patched a security vulnerability in our codebase,” Torba wrote “Our engineering team is conducting a full audit of our logs and infrastructure.”
The scam came on the same day that bitcoin’s market capitalization, the available value of bitcoin, surpassed $1 trillion. In the last month, in the middle of a surge of excitement fuelled by the rising mainstream adoption of cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin has risen more than 40%. Tesla has invested $1.5 billion in bitcoin, and Mastercard said it would later this year incorporate cryptocurrencies into its payment network. Bank of New York Mellon, the oldest bank in the U.S., said earlier this month that it will begin financing bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
Bitcoin scams have recently become a widespread plague on social media and Gab is not alone in being hit by one. A major bitcoin scam-hit Twitter last July as hackers took over high-profile accounts, including those of Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Kanye West and Barack Obama.
Gab, which has previously come under fire for anti-Semitic content, hails itself as a free speech platform, a self-characterization often used by Parler, a Twitter clone of the right-wing. Parler is working to get online after losing services from Amazon Web Services after it was revealed that the social network was used to coordinate the Jan. 6 attack on Capitol Hill.