Just hours before Monad’s highly anticipated airdrop, scammers managed to push fake advertisements directly into the project’s official Telegram announcement channel. Yes, you read that right — paid ads, inside what should be a secure official channel, promoting phishing links disguised as the real airdrop portal.
Monad co-founder Keone Hon took to X to warn users after discovering the malicious ads. “Crazy that Telegram will push content directly into a channel that otherwise only contains content from one party,” Hon said, pointing out the absurdity of the situation.
The timing couldn’t be worse (or better, if you’re a scammer). With the Monad airdrop scheduled to open at 1:00 pm UTC on Tuesday and MON tokens already trading at around $0.07 on Hyperliquid — implying a fully diluted valuation of roughly $7 billion — there’s massive user attention and money at stake. Scammers are trying to capitalize on exactly that.
How the Attack Actually Happened
Here’s what makes this particularly sneaky: Monad’s official announcement channel is supposed to be a one-way broadcast where only the team posts updates. Users can’t send messages. It’s meant to be a trusted source of information.
But Telegram’s advertising system apparently allows paid ads to appear inside these channels anyway. So while scrolling through official Monad announcements, users suddenly see what looks like legitimate links to claim their airdrop — except they’re actually phishing attempts designed to steal wallets or credentials.
The fake ads mimicked Monad’s upcoming claim portal, the website where users will actually collect their airdrop tokens. For someone not paying close attention, these ads could easily look like the real deal, especially given the hype and urgency surrounding crypto airdrops.
Don’t Rush — You Have Three Weeks
Hon’s main message to the community: slow down. Despite what scammers want you to think, there’s no rush.
“Do not act with urgency, and always triple-verify before doing anything,” Hon wrote. He emphasized that the portal will remain open for three full weeks, so there’s plenty of time to double-check, triple-check, and verify everything before clicking any links.
This is crucial advice for any crypto airdrop, but especially for one this size. Scammers thrive on creating false urgency. “Claim now or miss out!” “Limited time only!” These tactics push people to act before thinking. Don’t fall for it.
The real Monad team isn’t going to pull the rug out from under legitimate users. Take your time, verify URLs directly from official sources, and never trust links from unexpected places — even if they appear in what seems like an official channel.
MON Token Already Trading at $7 Billion Valuation
While the official token generation event hasn’t happened yet, MON tokens are already trading on Hyperliquid’s perpetual futures market. Current pricing around $0.07 per token translates to about $7 billion in fully diluted valuation based on the total supply of 100 billion tokens.
That’s massive for a network that hasn’t even launched yet. The early pricing reflects serious investor anticipation around Monad’s mainnet debut and its potential to compete with other high-performance blockchain networks.
So what makes Monad worth $7 billion pre-launch? The project is building a layer-1 blockchain that’s Ethereum Virtual Machine compatible while promising dramatically better performance. We’re talking 10,000 transactions per second with near-instant finality, achieved through parallel execution and optimized consensus mechanisms.
Monad claims to have solved the blockchain trilemma — the idea that networks can typically only achieve two out of three key attributes: scalability, security, and decentralization. Whether they’ve actually cracked it remains to be seen once the network goes live, but clearly investors are willing to bet big on the possibility.
Telegram’s Ad System Has a Serious Problem
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room: how did scammers manage to buy ads that appear inside an official announcement channel?
Telegram has extensive Ad Policies and Guidelines that explicitly prohibit exactly this kind of thing. Their policies ban deceptive advertising, content manipulation, spam software, hacking promotion, and harmful financial products or services.
Telegram specifically states: “Ads must not promote phishing, including services that trick a user into providing personal or other information.” The platform has all the right rules on paper. The problem is enforcement.
The Monad incident reveals a fundamental gap between Telegram’s policies and their ad vetting mechanisms. If scammers can purchase ads that violate multiple policy categories and have them approved to run in official channels, something is seriously broken in the review process.
Cointelegraph reached out to Telegram’s official press inquiry channel but received only an automated response. Not exactly reassuring when there’s a clear security issue affecting users.
This Isn’t Just a Monad Problem
While Monad is dealing with this specific attack right now, the vulnerability affects any project using Telegram for official communications. If scammers can buy their way into trusted channels, no community is safe.
The broader crypto community has dealt with phishing attacks forever. Fake websites, impersonator accounts, Discord compromises — it’s an ongoing battle. But having malicious ads appear inside official channels takes it to another level because it undermines one of the few remaining trusted information sources.
Projects typically tell users: “Only trust announcements from our official channels.” But what happens when those official channels contain paid advertisements disguised as legitimate content? The trust model breaks down.
Telegram needs to either disable ads in announcement channels entirely, implement much stricter vetting for crypto-related ads, or provide clearer visual separation between official content and paid promotions. The current system clearly isn’t working.
Protecting Yourself From Airdrop Scams
Whether it’s Monad or any other crypto airdrop, here’s how to avoid getting scammed:
Never act with urgency. Legitimate airdrops give you plenty of time to claim. If something claims “limited time” or “claim now,” that’s a red flag.
Verify URLs directly. Don’t click links from ads, social media, or messages. Go to the project’s official website or announcement yourself and find the correct link there.
Triple-check everything. Before connecting your wallet or signing any transaction, verify you’re on the real site. Check the URL carefully, look for the correct SSL certificate, and confirm through multiple official sources.
Use a separate wallet for airdrops. Don’t connect your main wallet with significant holdings. Use a dedicated wallet for claiming airdrops so if something goes wrong, damage is limited.
If it seems too good to be true, it probably is. Airdrops asking for payments, seed phrases, or private keys are always scams. Legitimate airdrops don’t require you to send crypto first.
The Takeaway
The Monad airdrop is happening, it’s legitimate, and there’s no rush to claim. You have three weeks. Use that time wisely.
Don’t click ads in Telegram channels, even official ones. Verify everything independently. And remember: scammers are counting on you to act quickly without thinking. Don’t give them what they want.
For Telegram, this incident should be a wake-up call. When scammers can buy ads that violate multiple platform policies and place them inside official channels targeting users excited about a $7 billion airdrop, the current system isn’t working. Stricter ad vetting and better protections for official channels aren’t optional — they’re necessary.
Stay safe out there, and take your time verifying before you click anything related to crypto airdrops. The extra five minutes of caution could save you from losing everything.