In recent weeks, an open-source project called Clawdbot has suddenly become popular in Silicon Valley. Although it has now been renamed Moltbot, the core concept remains the same: to have an AI agent reside on your local computer or server, capable of browsing web pages, clicking buttons, sending messages, and even automatically making transactions for you.
Once these "24/7 online AI employees" are connected to Web3, the possibilities become a new question: are they productivity tools or machines that could potentially take your assets at any time?
Clawdbot: An executable intelligent agent
Unlike ChatGPT, a cloud-based model that only supports dialogue, Clawdbot has several key features:
- Self-hosted and open-source: You can download the code and run it directly on your own machine or VPS. By default, the data will not be stored locally.
- Multiple access points: It can connect to chat tools such as Telegram, WhatsApp, Discord, and Slack. You give commands via chat, and it actually clicks web pages, calls APIs, and runs scripts for you in the background.
- Long-lasting memory: It's not about "forgetting after a question and answer," but about remembering the tasks, preferences, and context you were given beforehand, like a virtual colleague you've worked with for a long time.
- It allows for direct "hands-on" actions: tasks can be actually performed through browser automation, command lines, scripts, etc., such as clearing emails, booking airline tickets, and running trading strategies.
This means that Clawdbot can serve as a digital agent for long-running managed tasks. And this is exactly the kind of "executable intelligent agent" that Web3 needs.
Lowering the barrier to entry for Web3
The current pain points of Web3 are essentially centered around complexity and persistence, such as cumbersome on-chain operations, huge information noise, and high interaction frequency.
A person's attention span and operating time are objectively limited. Web3 talks about "infinite possibilities" in its narrative, but at the execution level, it is already very limited for an individual: you simply cannot monitor the market 24 hours a day, nor can you be so familiar with every protocol that you don't need to consult the documentation.
If you connect local AI agents like Clawdbot to wallets, block explorers, and DeFi interfaces, they are naturally suited to handle these key scenarios:
- 24/7 monitoring and alerts: Helping you keep track of liquidation lines, price ranges, LP zero abnormal losses, and governance voting deadlines.
- Automating repetitive actions across multiple chains: such as periodic reinvestment of returns, cross-chain replenishment, and rebalancing of positions.
- Strategy implementation: You describe the strategy in natural language, and the agent translates it into specific contract calls and transaction paths.
If the past decade has been about humans learning to use wallets and contracts themselves, then the next decade will likely be about humans learning to use intelligent agents to help them use wallets and contracts.
Local AI agents like Clawdbot will gradually become key players in resolving the contradiction between "information overload and execution overhead" in Web3 scenarios.
How to avoid risks?
Clawdbot has recently been the target of impersonation for cryptocurrency issuance and fraudulent token offerings, forcing its founder to publicly declare it a scam. Meanwhile, security companies have pointed out that many people lack server configuration skills, exposing their proxies to the public internet, leading to the risk of abuse of APIs, chat logs, and even execution permissions.
In the context of Web3, there are a few bottom lines that need to be clarified—
① Wallet permissions are extremely restricted; read-only access is used whenever possible.
② If signature permissions are to be granted, they should only be granted to "small-amount dedicated wallets," with strict limits and whitelists.
③ Do not believe in "official tokens" or "memes officially announced to be integrated with Web3". Clawdbot has been used to issue assets under false pretenses, followed by a classic scam pattern of a 90% drop after an initial surge, which completely exploited emotions and information asymmetry.
Furthermore, self-hosting does not equate to automatic security. If you don't properly configure your firewall and access control on your own server, you're essentially throwing an AI with root privileges—capable of executing commands—directly onto the public internet. This isn't enhanced privacy; it's building your own time bomb.
Finally, while the combination of automated agent assistants and Web3 is indeed imaginative, once wallets and signatures are involved, it's no longer a toy to experiment with, but a machine that can access your assets at any time. The extent of permissions you grant it isn't a technical detail, but a matter of life and death.
To put it more realistically, once an intelligent agent used as a "notebook" or "secretary" is compromised, it will not only leak a few seed phrase, but also your behavior, assets, habits, and social relationships over the past few years. It's like sending your entire person out in digital form.
The truly safe way to use it is to always remember this: an intelligent agent can act as an assistant, but never as a manager. Use read-only access whenever possible, issue alerts only when necessary, and carefully consider any permissions that exceed your intuitive comfort zone.
*The content of this article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. Investing involves risk; please invest cautiously.
