An art collector who thought he was purchasing Banksy’s first ever NFT artwork says he is both surprised and delighted to have his money returned by the hacker behind the elaborate scam.
The art lover, who wishes to remain anonymous, was drawn to the curious non-fungible token piece after it appeared to be a genuine sale on the website of the famous British artist.
However, the pseudonymous icon – whose works fetch millions or are even granted special protection when they appear overnight in unexpected places – had his official website hacked several days ago.
The hacker, it seems, had placed a page within banksy.co.uk displaying a pixel image of what resembled an industrial LS Lowry scene which was advertised as an NFT.
Its sale ended early when the Banksy fan – known online as ‘Pranksy’ – stumped up almost a quarter of a million pounds in Ethereum for what he believed was the mysterious dauber’s first entry into the world of NFTs.
After realising it may have been a scam, he immediately began attempting to track the hacker down, and even started following him on Twitter – a move he believes led to the refund.
Speaking to the BBC, Pranksy expressed surprise that he had been refunded the $336,000 of Ethereum.
“The refund was totally unexpected, I think the press coverage of the hack plus the fact that I had found the hacker and followed him on Twitter may have pushed him into a refund,” he said.
“I feel very lucky when a lot of others in a similar situation with less reach would not have had the same outcome.”
Pranksy explained that he was nudged on social platform Discord by a nameless member about the apparent Banksy auction.
He immediately checked the URL and, because it was on Banksy’s website with a link to an NFT artwork called the Great Redistribution of the Climate Change Disaster, he went in high and outbid his rivals by almost 90 per cent.
The auction ceased within minutes, and his bid in cryptocurrency was instantly transferred.
“I confirmed the URL on PC and mobile before bidding,” he added.
“I only made the bid because it was hosted on his site. When the bid was accepted I immediately thought it was probably fake.”
The team operating Banksy’s website have, as yet, refrained from explaining how the site was hacked, and have only so far stated “the artist Banksy has not created any NFT artworks”.
Earlier this evening, Pranksy had to bat away suggestions that he was part of a publicity stunt and somehow involved in the scam.
“Just to add a comment, to those who feel this may have been some sort of stunt, I would never risk a future relationship with Banksy or any fine artist by hiring someone to hack their website and then buying an NFT from myself,” he commented on Twitter.
“What an unusual day!”