A report on Thursday claims that hackers were able to launder US$10 million on Twitch through the platform’s Bits currency. Smaller streamers would take a 20% cut as part of a deal.
Twitch Money Laundering
It appears that the scam came to light after Twitch’s source code was leaked last month. A group of streamers in Turkey noticed that streamers with almost no followers were making thousands of dollars through Bit. This is a platform that lets viewers appreciate streamers with paid emojis. Twitch pays 1% of money from Bit to the streamer.
Hackers allegedly stole credit card data from people, then made deals with Twitch streamers to send them large amounts of money through Bit. The streamers would then refund 80% of the money to bank accounts owned by the scammers, keeping 20% for themselves.
Turkish Twitch streamer Grimnax tweeted a conversation with one of the hackers, shown below:
So far, Twitch has taken action against 150 streamers in Turkey for platform abuse.