By Kate Irwin
3 min read
Epic Games CEO and Co-Founder Tim Sweeney called out “cryptocurrency marketplaces” today for allegedly “enabling” unofficial and unauthorized cryptocurrencies bearing the “Fortnite” name.
Fortnite is Epic’s massively popular Battle Royale shooter game. First released in 2017, it now has more than 350 million registered users worldwide.
“There isn’t a Fortnite cryptocurrency,” Sweeney wrote. “The Twitter accounts promoting such a thing are a scam. Epic’s lawyers are on it. Also, shame on the cryptocurrency marketplaces that enable this kind of thing.”
Specifically, Sweeney is referring to the “Fortnite Token” (FNT), which is reportedly trading on decentralized exchanges SushiSwap, PancakeSwap, and CronaSwap.
A quick search for the alleged scam token on those exchanges does not currently return any results, though these decentralized exchanges enable their users to trade virtually any token so long as those users manually input the token’s contract address.
“This account is operating a scam,” Sweeney wrote, referring to the Twitter account @fortnite_token. “Anybody involved in this is being scammed,” he added in another response.
The Twitter account behind the unauthorized Fortnite token tried to argue that it wasn’t a scam despite the “CEO of Fortnite” stating numerous times it was one.
“This is a fair-launch, community-driven, Fortnite game fans-created cryptocurrency project with no specified owner or company structure behind it or a CEO deciding on its future,” the token’s account responded.
Sweeney was not amused.
“You can't use the Fortnite name and images without permission to market an unrelated product,” he replied.
Sweeney made at least 10 tweets in response to the "Fortnite token" he calls a "scam." Image: Twitter.
The alleged scammers are also encouraging Fortnite fans to mint NFTs with their tokens, which Sweeney called—unsurprisingly—a “scam.”
According to Nomics data, it appears that few are trading the FNT token. Since January, FNT is down 96% from its all-time high and is worth nearly zero at $0.0000007673. In the past 24 hours, the token has only seen about $250 in total volume traded.
This isn’t the first time malicious actors have reportedly used Fortnite’s branding without Epic’s consent. Back in October, reports surfaced that scammers were promising gamers that they could exchange their V-Bucks, Fortnite’s non-crypto, digital currency, for dollars using an unauthorized “Fortnite Coin.”
While Epic Games doesn’t have any Fortnite-related cryptocurrency, the company is leaning into Web3. Gala Games’ upcoming release GRIT—which features NFTs—will be the first blockchain game to be released on the Epic Games store. NFTs are unique tokens that are used to demonstrate ownership over digital assets, such as in-game items.
Sweeney previously shared back in September, however, that Epic Games isn’t “touching NFTs as the whole field is currently tangled up with an intractable mix of scams.”
Today, he clarified his position.
“When new technology emerges, some put it to good use, and others put it to bad use. It would be terribly shortsighted to ban an entire field of technology for such a reason.”
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