What To Do If Your Wallet Gets Drained?

You took your precautions. You did everything you thought you're supposed to do. You even downloaded CryptoGuard. But you just so happened to click on a link that you shouldn't have. The crypto scammers got you. Your funds and NFTs have completely been drained from your crypto wallet. 

A drained wallet can drive someone to the depths of despair. It's all gone! What do you do now?

Don't Panic! 

First things first: count your blessings. Yes, it is extremely hard to look at the good when you've been rekt from a wallet draining. But you're still breathing. No one died. If you let the enormity of the wallet drain suffuse your very being, you won't be able to think clearly. And that's exactly what you need to do to get your money back.

‍Check the Transactions

Double-check the transaction history of your wallet to confirm any unauthorized or unexpected transactions. Sometimes, transaction delays or network issues can give the appearance of missing funds. Or, you may have unfortunately sent funds to the wrong address, like this guy:

If your wallet has definitely been drained, analyze your transactions to figure out where the crypto scammers snagged you. Was it address poisoning? (link to article on that I just wrote, maybe w/ an HTML anchor directly to the content). Was it malware or a malicious link? You need to pin down the transactions that caused the wallet draining so you can investigate the money trail. 

‍Lock It Down - Security Check

Run a full antivirus and malware scan on all of your devices. Make sure you haven't downloaded any malicious wallet draining software or plugins to either your computer or your phone. Change passwords and enable two-factor authentication (2FA) on every account associated with the compromised wallet. This includes email accounts, cryptocurrency exchanges, and any other platforms where you use the same credentials.

‍File All the Reports  

If your drained wallet was hosted on a centralized exchange it's important to contact their support team and let them know what happened. 

When it comes to self-custodial wallets, however, Gleb Shumakov, head of community at Zerion, gives fair warning: "Self-custodial wallet (support teams) can't help in those cases, so prevention steps should ideally be taken when the wallet is first set up."

Even though it doesn't seem like they'd be able to help much, filing a police report creates an official record of the wallet drain. In case you do figure out who drained your wallet and they're in a locale where you can file proceedings against them, you'll need this official document to press charges. The police might take the time to forward the complaint to cybercrime or other law enforcement agencies. Who knows? Your complaint may become a building block in a huge case against some large-scale crypto scammers.

If your drained wallet held a significant amount of funds, there are crypto investigation firms who may be able to help you get your money back. But they're costly. Firms like Chainalysis and Recover My Crypto employ professionals who perform blockchain analysis to track down who stole your money. 

‍Publicize

Many people with notable followings on X have posted about their wallet drain, sharing the specifics like transactions and wallets involved in the wallet draining in order to warn the crypto community. Often, others within the community take interest and try to help by tracking down the perpetrators themselves. And others from the crypto community will chime in with similar wallet draining experiences from the same bad actors. 

Publicizing your wallet drain may help you find out who did it and keep others in the crypto community safe, as you can see from the above posts. 

‍Constant Vigilance

It goes without saying that you shouldn't use the compromised wallet anymore. Disconnect it from all the dApps you use. I'd even say transfer assets that weren't drained to a new wallet, but you need to check each of those assets to make sure that they do not set off further malicious activity. For example. this could be an airdrop that looks as if it's the same token address as a legitimate holding you might still have. Keep checking your drained wallet for further suspicious transactions, and most importantly, learn from your mistakes. 

Never store your passwords, seed phrases or private keys on a cloud server like Google or iCloud. Write them down, take photos of what you wrote and store them on offline USB drives to be placed in safe locations. But this will not protect you from wallet draining as a result of human error. Deep dive into an intensive article about how you can avoid crypto scams here.

‍In Conclusion

Let's face it. Experiencing a wallet drain is horrific. But you have to act fast if you want a chance of getting back your crypto. Stay calm and keep a clear head. Analyze your wallet history to figure out what transactions sparked your wallet draining. Secure your devices. If your wallet was on a centralized exchange, contact support. Decide whether or not you want to file a police report. Publicize the wallet draining on social media. And most importantly, learn from your mistakes. We're sorry this happened to you. But at the end of the day, there's always a chance to rebuild.