Zora Team Accused of Token Sales Prior to Airdrop

The social NFT platform for content monetization, Zora, has found itself embroiled in controversy following the airdrop of its eponymous token. 

The Sequence of Events

A week ago, the exchange Coinbase introduced a new trend Coin everything, which was quickly adopted by the Base ecosystem, as noted in a Telegram channel by representatives of the AML service BitOK. The ZORA token received backing from the official account of the L2 solution.

Days later, the social platform’s team confirmed the airdrop. Base again provided support but did not mention any investments in the project, as clarified by BitOK.

On April 23, users began receiving ZORA without prior warnings. Community members criticized the platform for the lack of official statements.

According to BitOK, the Zora team sent almost the entire drop to their own wallets. 

Some of these addresses were linked to exchanges Bybit and KuCoin, raising suspicions of corruption in asset distribution. Wallets with more than 100 million ZORA were also noted.

“They definitely appropriated some of the coins and certainly sold them before the announcement,” ForkLog was told by BitOK founder Dmitry Machikhin.

He emphasized that initially, Zora representatives owned 65% of the total token allocation. According to the speaker, his team will conduct an independent investigation and gather evidence to prove their guilt.

“The market is currently in a phase of airdrops and meme coins, which scammers exploit for quick profit,” Machikhin stated.

A Case in Point

A drop hunter under the nickname Anton ProfiT shared his experience participating in the ZORA distribution. 

The $ZORA token airdrop is a prime example of total injustice in Web3.

? Instead of fairly rewarding active users, the @Zora team:
1️⃣ Sent nearly the entire drop to their own wallets
2️⃣ Gave pennies to regular users who spent real money minting and growing the ecosystem
3️⃣… pic.twitter.com/USkPeNF3TX

— ????? ?????? (@AntonProfiT) April 24, 2025

According to him, the Zora team promised automatic distribution before listing, yet within the first 2.5 hours, they began selling tokens on the exchange “at a good price.” Only after this did representatives “quietly open the portal for token acquisition.”

Zora promoted a referral program but banned the most active users for it, Anton ProfiT highlighted.

He recounted that his wallet showed a distribution of 34 million ZORA. After a “30-fold reduction,” the drop hunter was entitled to more than 1 million tokens. However, he was blocked “for excessive activity.”

“Zora is not Web3. It is a centralized scam disguised as decentralization,” concluded Anton ProfiT.

At the time of writing, ZORA is trading at ~$0.02. From a peak of $0.4, the coin has fallen by nearly 50%.

Earlier, on April 16, Base faced criticism following the collapse of the token Base is for everyone, launched on Zora.