Anna Sorokin wants to rehabilitate her image. So, she's going to sell…NFTs?!
Sorokin became known as the "socialite scammer" for scamming wealthy individuals in New York City's social scene out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Sorokin, going by Anna Delvey, pretended she was a rich German heiress who simply couldn't access her fortune while overseas. Her scheme eventually fell apart and she was arrested and sentenced to 4 to 12 years in prison. Sorokin was released from prison in April but is currently being held by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement where she is fighting deportation.
And, of course, Sorokin found new levels of fame after Netflix released a series earlier this year about the scammer called Inventing Anna. But, Sorokin isn't done working for her success and earning her accomplishments. And the current thing she's working towards is changing how people view her.
In an interview with NBC News, Sorokin says she would like to ditch the "scammer persona" she's known for. And how is she planning on doing that? Apparently, by launching her own line of non-fungible tokens, better known as NFTs.
NFTs are digital assets stored on a blockchain that link to a piece of online media content, usually used to show ownership of said media.
And while not everyone buying and selling NFTs is a scammer, the space is rife with scams. There have been countless rug pulls, which is when a developer suddenly abandons their crypto or NFT project and runs away with everyone's money. NFTs often help facilitate art theft, where artists find that their work was stolen and sold as NFTs without their permission. Legitimate NFTs, sold by the original artist, aren't safe from scams either, with hackers often targeting holders of highly-valued NFTs, which they then steal and resell on the aftermarket. An employee of OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace, was just arrested for insider trading of NFTs.
"I’m trying to move away from this like, quote-unquote scammer persona," Sorokin told NBC News in an interview.
So, if one was looking to shed that "scammer persona" which they were most known for, selling NFTs probably wouldn't be the first route to go, to be honest.
According to NBC News, Sorokin is calling her NFT collection "Reinventing Anna," an obvious nod to the Netflix series. While details seem pretty thin right now, NBC reports that 10 of the minted NFTs will include exclusive perks where the holder of a Reinventing Anna NFT will have access to "one-on-one phone calls" with Sorokin. The collection will also include three "ultra platinum" NFTs, which will come with an in-person meeting with Sorokin. NFT holders will also receive a package containing some "personal items" from the infamous scammer.
If Sorokin really wants to get rid of the scammer label, she may have to work a bit harder.
In March, while Sorokin was still in prison, the fake heiress put on an art show in New York called Free Anna Delvey with the help of some artists. One of those artists, Julia Morrison, now claims she has yet to be reimbursed the US$8,000 she is owed for helping to put together the exhibit. Ironically, Morrison's medium of choice is, you guessed it, NFTs.
A favorite slogan in the NFT space from its staunchest advocates is to quip "have fun staying poor" at critics and detractors. Regardless of how Sorokin's NFT project goes, the crypto/web3/NFT space seems like a perfect fit for her.
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