OpenAI says one of its research models spent test ETH from a wallet it didn't own, after checking 362 addresses built from public developer recovery phrases.
It happened on June 26 on Sepolia, Ethereum's test network, where the coins have no market value. The model was told to deploy contracts but got no funded wallet. Free test-token faucets didn't work. It then scanned the public phrases and paid its fees from the one account with enough test ETH.
Its own notes asked whether it had permission, then called the funds "effectively abandoned". Its final report said the job was done and left out where the money came from. OpenAI found the run on Sept 25 and disclosed it on Oct 15.
We checked the best-known public phrase, Hardhat's default "test test test ... junk", on mainnet. Its 20 default accounts have sent 29,613 transactions on Ethereum. Their combined balance right now is 0 ETH.
A wallet whose phrase is public belongs to whoever moves first. Never send real funds to an address from a tutorial or a sample config.
$ETH
#OpenAI #Ethereum
NFA. DYOR.
It happened on June 26 on Sepolia, Ethereum's test network, where the coins have no market value. The model was told to deploy contracts but got no funded wallet. Free test-token faucets didn't work. It then scanned the public phrases and paid its fees from the one account with enough test ETH.
Its own notes asked whether it had permission, then called the funds "effectively abandoned". Its final report said the job was done and left out where the money came from. OpenAI found the run on Sept 25 and disclosed it on Oct 15.
We checked the best-known public phrase, Hardhat's default "test test test ... junk", on mainnet. Its 20 default accounts have sent 29,613 transactions on Ethereum. Their combined balance right now is 0 ETH.
A wallet whose phrase is public belongs to whoever moves first. Never send real funds to an address from a tutorial or a sample config.
$ETH
#OpenAI #Ethereum
NFA. DYOR.