Allegations have emerged linking a former OpenSea employee to the controversial AnubisDAO rug pull in 2021. However, OpenSea has expressed unawareness of any such involvement and has noted the limited scope of the former employee’s responsibilities.
The accusations surfaced on social media, with the anonymous account NFT Ethics tagging OpenSea in an Oct. 6 Twitter thread. The thread raised questions about Kevin Pawlak, OpenSea’s former head of ventures, and his alleged connection to the pseudonymous identity “0xSisyphus.” NFT Ethics and the blockchain analytics account Lookonchain claimed that 0xSisyphus, and consequently Pawlak, played a pivotal role in promoting the AnubisDAO project to investors before the project moved the raised funds to external wallets.
The thread suggested that Pawlak’s alleged involvement in the AnubisDAO rug pull was premeditated in collaboration with other developers and that the proceeds were laundered through the memecoin Pepe (PEPE).
1/ Dear @OpenSea, what do you think of the fact that your Head of Ventures, Kevin Pawlak, has been involved in various very dubious business dealings (e.g. Anubis) and pump & dump schemes under his pseudonymous identity @0xSisyphus (& 0xMagellan)? pic.twitter.com/GzIVLJirLE
— NFT Ethics (@NFTethics) October 6, 2023
OpenSea responded to these allegations by stating that it was unaware of Pawlak’s involvement in such activities. The company also clarified that Pawlak had a “limited scope” during his tenure at OpenSea.
“Kevin is a former employee who left the company in June 2023. He had a limited scope while at OpenSea — where he worked in a non-management position. We have no awareness of his involvement with the projects in question. Furthermore, we have no connection to, or information about, the projects in question, as they took place before his time at OpenSea,” said the company representative.
In October 2021, AnubisDAO raised 13,556 Ether, equivalent to $60 million at the time, from cryptocurrency investors. However, within approximately 20 hours, the funds were transferred to various wallet addresses, resulting in an immediate loss for investors.
Blockchain investigator ZachXBT cast doubt on the allegations, describing the Twitter thread as “mid-curve” and highlighting that it made numerous assumptions about 0xSisyphus’ involvement without concrete evidence.
That thread is one of the most midcurve things I have read. They make many assumptions off unrelated events without facts.
— ZachXBT (@zachxbt) September 29, 2023
FixedFloat does tons in volume and same with the other exchanges mentioned. Here is the source address of the April 2023 FixedFloat insider PEPE buys I… https://t.co/0kG2M7DNVi
Moreover, 0xSisyphus had reportedly offered a 1,000 ETH bounty to anyone who could identify the wallet address responsible for draining the pool and had engaged law enforcement in both the United States and Hong Kong, raising further doubts about the allegations.
ZachXBT noted that while negligence and misrepresentation might have occurred, the individuals primarily responsible for the loss of funds during the AnubisDAO incident were pseudonymous users known as “Beerus” and “Ersan.”
The situation highlights the complexities of tracing responsibility and accountability in the world of cryptocurrency and decentralized projects, where identities are often concealed, and allegations can be challenging to substantiate.
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