Malicious browser extensions
A fake wallet extension, or a real extension that was sold or hijacked, reads your seed phrase or swaps transactions as you sign.
How it works
Fake wallets copy the name and logo of real ones and sneak into extension stores, often promoted by ads. They ask you to 'import' your seed phrase and send it to the attacker.
Other extensions start honest (a price tracker, a tab manager) and turn malicious after an update, sometimes after the developer sold it.
Because extensions can read and change web pages, a bad one can alter the address or amount you see.
Red flags
- A wallet extension that asks for your seed phrase right after installing
- Few reviews, a new publisher, or a name slightly different from the real one
- An extension asking to 'read and change all your data on all websites' without a reason
Protect yourself
- Install wallets only from the link on the wallet's official site
- Keep extensions to a minimum in the browser you use for crypto
- Use a hardware wallet so a compromised browser can't sign alone
If you already signed
- Remove the extension, then move funds to a new wallet with a new seed phrase made on a clean device
- Treat any seed phrase typed into the browser as exposed
Incidents using it 3
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Medium◐Partly contained
16 fake Rabby and OKX Wallet add-ons on Firefox stole recovery phrases and private keys
Socket found 16 Firefox extensions posing as Rabby Wallet (branded 'Raabby WaIIet') and OKX Wallet ('Portal WALLET'). They captured 12- or 24-word recovery phrases and private keys during the wallet import step and sent them to attacker-run Cloudflare Workers. Mozilla removed them by 5 October 2026, but Socket links them to a crypto-theft extension campaign it first saw in August 2026, so new copies may appear. No loss figure has been published; anyone who imported a seed into one of them should treat that wallet as stolen.
Firefox users who installed fake Rabby Wallet or OKX Wallet add-ons·Multiple EVM chains·Since Oct 5, 2026·
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High◐Partly contained
19 Chrome and Edge extensions hid a wallet drainer that hijacked Connect Wallet and Swap buttons
Socket found 19 Chrome and Edge extensions, from crypto price trackers and explorers to general tools like 'Enable Right Click & Copy' (70,000+ Chrome users), that loaded a modular malware framework. It drained EVM, Solana and Tron wallets by hijacking 'Connect Wallet' and 'Swap' buttons, swapped Ledger and Trezor sites for seed-phishing pages and stole exchange sessions; five extensions were bought from their original developers and turned malicious through updates. Socket thinks the campaign may date back to early 2024. Google removed the Chrome listings, but when BleepingComputer reported it on 30 August 2026 the Edge version of one was still available.
Users of 19 Chrome/Edge extensions incl. 'Enable Right Click & Copy', 'Multi-Chain Explorer' and 'LedgerLook: Wallet Checker'·Multiple EVM chains, Solana, Tron·Since Aug 30, 2026·
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Critical✓Contained
Trojanized Trust Wallet Chrome extension v2.68 steals seed phrases; $8.5M drained from 2,520 wallets
A malicious version 2.68 of the Trust Wallet browser extension was published to the Chrome Web Store on Dec 24, 2025 with a leaked store API key, skipping the normal release review. It harvested seed phrases through a modified analytics library and sent them to metrics-trustwallet[.]com. Early reports put losses near $7M; Trust Wallet's post-mortem says about $8.5M was drained from 2,520 wallet addresses across BTC, ETH and SOL, and traces the leak to the Shai-Hulud 2.0 npm worm. The fixed v2.69 shipped on Dec 25 and Trust Wallet says it will reimburse affected users; mobile app users were not affected.
Trust Wallet Chrome extension v2.68·Solana, Bitcoin, Ethereum·$8.5M stolen·Since Dec 24, 2025·