Trader who lost $26M to copy-paste error says it’s been ‘max pain’

A trader who recently revealed they had lost $25 million back in June after copying in the wrong deposit address says the experience has been “max pain.”

Pseudonymous crypto investor qklpjeth told Cointelegraph that they accidentally transferred 7,912 Renzo restaked ETH (ezETH) — worth $26.4 million at current prices — to a safe contract address on June 19.

Unfortunately, they said they entered the incorrect address and sent the funds to a safe module instead of his own safe, meaning that the tokens were “locked and unable to be withdrawn.”

When asked about how the mistake was made, qklpjeth offered a short response:

“In one word: wrong copy.”

While the mishap occurred nearly five months ago, they only recently put the call out to white hat hackers on X after exhausting all the traditional avenues for recovering their funds.

Qklpjeth said they asked for help publicly in the hope that someone would be able to identify and exploit a smart contract bug that would allow them to recover their funds in full.

The crypto community has been quick to offer advice. Responding to qklpjeth’s original X post, DefiLlama developer 0xngmi said the best possible course of action would be to contact the Renzo protocol directly and request that they alter their token contract. 

Unfortunately, qklpjeth said they had already contacted Renzo directly in a bid to recover the funds, but the protocol couldn’t assist due to regulatory limitations. 

A wake-up call for better UX

Meanwhile, Harrison Seletsky, director of business development at digital identity platform SPACE ID, told Cointelegraph that the multimillion-dollar mishap was a “wake-up call” for better user experience in the crypto industry. 

“It’s shocking that simple copy and paste errors are still costing people millions in crypto,” he said. 

Related: DeltaPrime exploited for $4.8M worth of ARB and AVAX tokens

“It’s an awful experience to go through and I truly hope that this crypto user can recover their assets, but stories like this are a wake-up call for our industry. We need to do better.”

Seletsky said these kinds of mistakes simply shouldn’t be possible in crypto more than a decade after Bitcoin was invented, adding that mass adoption couldn’t occur until everyday users felt safe in their ability to transfer funds without the risk of losing it all because of a simple typo. 

“Most people, given the choice between entrusting their financial security to a centralized entity and trusting themselves not to make errors will choose the former,” said Seletsky. 

“The UX is the key to unlocking mass crypto adoption, so there needs to be far more focus on UX, starting with crypto transactions first and foremost.”

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