Exposing an Absurd Scam: Project Teams Hire Fake Online Armies to Impersonate Celebrities and Sell Cryptocurrencies
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Exposing an Absurd Scam: Project Teams Hire Fake Online Armies to Impersonate Celebrities and Sell Cryptocurrencies
All because of Telegram nicknames? These pranksters say they don't feel embarrassed about impersonating celebrities.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsWritten by: Ryan S. Gladwin, Decrypt
Translated by: Felix, PANews
A supplement company allegedly hired a group of online trolls to impersonate celebrities, deceive investors, and promote its cryptocurrency token. The scheme worked for a while—until it was exposed.
Insane Labz, an Arkansas-based supplement company with a strong reputation in MMA and Barstool Sports circles—and a former client of entrepreneur Gary Vaynerchuk’s mentorship program—launched its LABZ token in May, promising on its roadmap collaborations with "vetted celebrities." However, the project instead encouraged trolls to impersonate figures such as UFC president Dana White, MMA legend Nate Diaz, and social media personality Hasbulla, promoting the LABZ token within its Telegram group.
This scam helped the LABZ token surge from a $3 million market cap to a peak of $15 million. Today, the token is nearly worthless, down over 90%. But before that collapse, these obvious deceptions fooled some inexperienced investors into buying.
Blockchain data reviewed by Decrypt and blockchain analytics firm Bubblemaps shows crypto wallets linked to the Insane Labz team paid small fees—$155 worth of Solana per person—to this group of trolls.
“We were just doing it as a joke, but it kind of got out of hand,” one of the impersonators said.
"Hasbulla" joins chat, with investors questioning if it's really him
"Hasbulla" Joins the Chat
On May 16, the first fake celebrity, “TheOfficialHasbulla,” joined the Insane Labz Telegram chat. The account appeared to belong to Hasbulla Magomedovich Magomedov—a viral internet personality with dwarfism who has 8 million Instagram followers. The real Magomedov does not speak English, so the impersonator could only communicate through Google Translate and GIFs.
Nonetheless, some users questioned his authenticity in the chat. Insane Labz moderators responded vaguely. “Maybe he’s real,” replied the Insane Labz account in the Telegram group.
Users reacted immediately.
The Insane Labz token surged 115% within 12 hours. At that point, wallets associated with the company had not yet paid the fake Hasbulla. During this period, two wallets linked to Insane Labz sold approximately $12,450 worth of LABZ tokens while also purchasing more.
A wallet associated with the "Hasbulla" persona heavily promoted the project
The largest single sale of LABZ occurred three days later, on May 19, when the token price was still high, though past its peak. An unidentified whale dumped over $70,000 worth of tokens, pocketing roughly $68,000 in profit after buying on launch day.
The Hasbulla impersonator said his friends then joined the group over the following two weeks: a fake UFC president Dana White, and a fake UFC fighter Nate Diaz.
The Nate Diaz impersonator explained that fake Hasbulla regularly joins groups pretending to be the famous Dagestani. “Then when we saw how crazy the reaction was from Insane Labz about Hasbulla joining the chat, we thought, let’s flip it and get in on the joke,” he said.
Fans loved it when the fake Nate Diaz spoke up in the chat
Justin Ozuna, Hasbulla’s business manager—who helped secure Hasbulla a five-year promotional deal with the UFC—said, “Hasbulla had no idea about this company or its token.” “I highly suspect the same is true for Dana White and Nate Diaz.”
Another LABZ investor said the project didn’t just allow impersonators—it actively encouraged them. Insane Labz “made memes of the token using celebrity faces and hyped it every time a celebrity posted in chat.” Insane Labz CEO Dustin Lebleu even pretended to have a FaceTime call with the real Dana White about the project.
“The founder posted a FaceTime chat with ‘Dana White’ and asked ‘Dana’ for a screenshot of the chat,” said a Telegram member—including both impersonators and individual investors—who believed Dustin Lebleu was managing the account.
“He later posted what I believe was a doctored FaceTime screenshot,” the investor said, providing a screenshot from the Insane Labz Telegram group.
According to the Insane Labz account, Dana White had a FaceTime call with the LABZ team
On May 28, the fake Dana White told the official Insane Labz Telegram group he planned to give away four tickets to an upcoming UFC event. The Insane Labz team seized the moment and promoted the giveaway on Twitter. The LABZ token rose 17%—and at that moment, the Labz team contacted the fake White, offering payment to continue the ruse.
The impersonator claimed the official Insane Labz account reached out to the fake Dana White, offering to pay the “troll” and his friends to keep posting messages in the Telegram chat. They eventually agreed on $155 worth of Solana (about 1 SOL) per week.
Data from Bubblemaps revealed a link between one of the wallets that sent 1 SOL ($150) to the impersonators and the original wallet that created the LABZ token. Wallet DvFne1 sent 150 SOL ($24,000) to wallet CLrC8m, which later paid a total of 3 SOL ($459) to the impersonators. The original DvFne1 wallet also funded FtfPXX, the address used to mint the LABZ token.
Thomas Perrin, chief investigator at Bubblemaps, said: “We can assume the central wallet (DvFne1) is a team wallet, since it was the first to fund FtfPXX, the minting wallet. Therefore, the payment wallet is closely related to the team wallet.”
Perrin also noted the payment method—sending funds through multiple different wallets—was suspicious. “Why not use a wallet labeled for marketing?”
Bubble chart showing how the payment wallet links to the minting address
Telegram screenshots provided by the impersonators were also reviewed, showing coordination with the Labz team regarding payments, including transaction links sent at the time of payment.
"The Whole Thing Was Fraud"
Over the next month, a total of 15 SOL was sent to the impersonators’ wallets, which they claim came from Insane Labz. Meanwhile, LABZ investors remained misled into believing the celebrity endorsements were genuine.
An Insane Labz investor said: “I realized the whole thing was fraud.”
The conversations between the impersonators and Insane Labz clearly show the project actively encouraged the deception. According to screenshots provided by the impersonators, operators of the Insane Labz account joked around with the fake celebrities in another Telegram group called “Labz UFC Hype Group.”
In a private message, the fake Nate Diaz wrote: “I thought the real Nate would be going crazy right now lol.” The Labz account replied: “LOL, you’re the real Nate…”
The most glaring red flag was Hasbulla himself—he doesn’t speak English, yet the impersonator chatted fluently. Screenshots show the fake Hasbulla once saying he’d try to find AI text-to-speech software to create voice notes in Hasbulla’s voice.
The Labz account responded: “That’s disgusting.”
Fake Hasbulla considered using AI voice generation
The impersonators said their Telegram inboxes were flooded with hundreds of messages and calls from fans demanding proof they were real.
One LABZ investor said: “I realized the whole thing was fraudulent—the founders knew full well these people weren’t the real Dana White or others, but exploited their fame to pump the token price. I sold my tokens and left the group.”
LABZ investors regularly messaged these trolls asking if they were real
The Scam Unravels
Eventually, the hype faded and the token price dropped. In response, the impersonators said the Labz team asked if they could add Chad Kroeger, lead singer of Nickelback. They agreed.
After adding a fake Kroeger account on June 27, the token spiked 17%. But it was short-lived. The token plunged 74% over the next two weeks. Communication between the fake celebrities and Insane Labz began to break down.
After someone joined the Labz group and messaged “Dana White,” the Insane Labz team instructed the impersonators to stop posting. That night, the Telegram chat was deleted. Insane Labz claimed on its official X account that the group was removed due to death threats.
Now that it’s all over, the pranksters say they feel no remorse for impersonating celebrities.
The fake Hasbulla said: “I’ve been using this nickname for years and been in hundreds of Telegram groups—no one’s ever played along like this before. Anyone with half a brain knows it’s just a Telegram handle.”
Before entering crypto, Arkansas-based Insane Labz was founded in 2014 and became known for its sports supplements. According to Zoominfo, its products are sold through online retailers like Amazon and Walmart, generating around $15.2 million in annual revenue.
The company’s founder and CEO, Dustin Lebleu, was a client of VaynorMentors, a startup consulting service run by renowned entrepreneur Gary Vaynerchuk, better known as Gary Vee.
Gary Vaynerchuk praised Dustin Lebleu in a 2019 blog post—but that post has since been deleted.
A representative for Gary Vaynerchuk said: “Gary is out with family this week, but we can confirm there has been no official affiliation or endorsement between Gary/VaynerX and Insane Labz since a brief consulting engagement in 2018.”
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