Scammers exploit Clippy in cryptocurrency scam targeting Microsoft account

The infamous Microsoft mascot Clippy, a virtual assistant from the late 1990s, recently found itself at the center of a cryptocurrency scam. Scammers created a fake X account named ClippyMSFTCo, promoting a fraudulent Clippy memecoin and asking Microsoft how many likes would be needed to bring Clippy back.

The scam escalated when the fraudsters hacked Microsoft’s official X account, which has 13 million followers, and retweeted the promotional post. To make matters worse, an apology post appeared on Microsoft’s account, but this too was fake and posted by the scammers.

Microsoft later regained control of its account, deleted the fake posts, and issued a genuine statement: “We are aware of a cryptocurrency token being promoted in connection with $MSFT stock, including the unauthorized use of the Clippy brand and Microsoft-related intellectual property.” X also deleted the account that initially promoted the memecoin scam.