75,000 XRP Returned by Scammer, John Deaton Praises Community Efforts

CryptoLaw founder and blockchain enthusiast John Deaton praised the XRP community after a scammer returned 75,000 XRP stolen from a user. “The very definition of community,” wrote Deaton. David Schwartz, Ripple’s CTO, also expressed his delight with the return of the stolen funds.

The very definition of community. 👏 https://t.co/tFaiGpgLnM

— John E Deaton (@JohnEDeaton1) January 16, 2023

In a series of events that started on Jan. 11, a user named “Hector” complained that his bag of XRP had been stolen while updating his firmware on a fake Ledger site. Responses came in from the XRP community as well as Nik Bougalis, former director of engineering at Ripple, who commended the user for raising the alert on fake Ledger websites.

A particular XRP user, “Tiffany Hayden,” who picked up interest in the matter, alerted the community of a similar instance of a user’s funds being stolen through the fake ledger website. She also posted an address where the funds were sent.

In a twist, another user, “Lisa,” who had also suffered the same fate, responded in a thread of tweets by providing the address of the scammer.

Within hours of the details of the scammer surfacing, the first transfer of 50 XRP was made to the user who provided the address, followed by another 75,000 XRP, as evidenced by Bithomp Explorer.

The return of the funds drew curiosity as several asked what could have prompted the scammer to return his loot; the response was that “maybe he was moved by heartfelt messages seen to him through the Bithomp transaction memo field.”

In the wake of the rising theft of crypto funds, users are urged to double check website addresses before proceeding with any activity. Users are also encouraged to use the address book feature in their wallets to avoid manually copying addresses and transferring funds to the wrong addresses.