- A Snoop Dogg impersonator fooled people at an NFT conference into thinking he was in attendance.
- The stunt, carried out by an NFT startup, was designed to expose the dangers of fakes in the space.
- Snoop Dogg has previously championed NFTs and other Web3 technology.
A Snoop Dogg impersonator tricked crowds at an NFT conference in New York into believing he was the real deal in a stunt designed to show how easy fakery in the industry is.
The impersonator, who went by the moniker Doop Snogg, attended the NFT.NYC conference in New York City this week and took selfies alongside eager Snoop Dogg fans.
The NFT startup which hired the lookalike, Fair.xyz, said the trick was supposed to make people talk about imposters and fakery in the NFT industry.
"We used Doop Snogg as a fun way of highlighting our goal of removing imposters, bots and fraud away from the NFT space," the company said in a statement sent to Insider.
NFT sales have tanked in recent months as people struggled to sell NFTs for original prices, while others have been caught out by scams and theft.
In April, scammers stole over $3 million from NFT holders after hacking the Instagram page of the popular collection, Yuga Labs' Bored Ape Yacht Club. In January, NFT marketplace OpenSea also revealed that 80% of NFTs created for free on its platform were spam, per Vice.
NFT sales have plummeted 92% since their peak in September 2021.
The lookalike — who didn't reveal their full name — wore a fake moustache and packed paper in their shoes to appear taller, The Guardian reported.
People who bumped into the imposter were tricked and tweeted pictures, with one user captioning their tweet: "My hand are shaky but I think I just caught @SnoopDogg. Thank you for the selfie."
Snoop Dogg retweeted a post captioning it solely with his lookalike's namesake.
A representative for Fair.xyz did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
NFTs surged in popularity last year, with sales buoyed up by the support of A-listers like Snoop Dogg.
The artist has previously championed Web3 technology, including crypto, NFTs, and the metaverse. His latest music video is set in a "Snoopverse" digital world.
The star has also released his own NFTs and has claimed to be collecting NFTs under the pseudonym, Cozomo de' Medici.