Binance Freezes 4.20M XRP Linked to Ripple Co-Founder’s Hack

Diligent on-chain sleuths are helping Ripple fight one of the most alarming hacks in the cryptosphere this year.

by Tadas Klimasevskis. Fact checked by: Ciaran Lawler, Editor: Stefan Trapp

Published: February 2, 2024 │ 9:00 PM GMT

Binance took XRP coins to their freezing zone. — *Created by Kornelija Poderskytė from DailyCoin*

Ripple’s co-founder Chris Larsen fell victim to a $112.5M XRP hack.
Binance continues to monitor the external wallets with stolen funds.
Hovering around $0.50, XRP recovered the hack-induced 4% deficit.

Cybercriminals have sent ripples across the vibrant XRP community after it was confirmed that Ripple’s co-founder and Executive Chairman, Chris Larsen, fell victim to a sophisticated attack against his wallets. Resulting in a loss of an eye-watering $112.5 million, the coordinated exploit was first thought to have targeted Ripple as a whole.

Binance’s cybercrime prevention unit announced it has frozen nearly 4% of the stolen digital funds. With approximately 213 million XRP tokens in question, the $4.20 million worth of XRP retrieved by Binance’s on-chain sleuths is a good starting point in the process, as CEO Richard Teng pledged that his team will keep monitoring the stolen funds, located in various external wallets.

Appreciate @silkjaer's note on wording – to clarify, these were @chrislarsensf’s personal wallets that were exploited. And an extra shoutout to @XRPLF for all their great work on this case as well.
— Richard Teng (@_RichardTeng) February 1, 2024

However, Thomas Silkjaer, the Head of Analytics & Compliance at XRP Ledger Foundation, called to clear up the situation: “The compromised accounts are personal accounts, not an exploit at Ripple.”

Here’s How the $112.5M Incident Affected XRP Price

While XRP slid below $0.50 for the first time in three months, the token rebounded calmly and trades slightly above $0.50 with a 3.5% weekly deficit.

Not completely systemic, but through networks it’s possible to act quickly to many threats. Such as the Crypto Defenders Alliance (CDA). Over time you develop great relationships, and it is evident through these relationships who the responsible and irresponsible exchanges are.
— Thomas Silkjær (@Silkjaer) February 1, 2024

As the investigation escalates, Ripple now takes the reins in solving the remaining crime details. This was also confirmed by Thomas Silkjaer, who insisted that Ripple did a “complete handover of data” to the relevant parties, including the Crypto Defenders Alliance (CDA), in a mutual effort to combat online financial fraud as quickly as possible.

On The Flipside

So far, Binance’s retrieved funds represent just 3.75% of the $112.5M looted by the cybercriminals.
Ripple’s CEO Brad Garlinghouse assured that core Ripple crypto wallets haven’t been exposed to the hack.

Why This Matters

Large-scale hacks targeting prominent crypto space figures expose security gaps that must be addressed to slow the rising crypto-related hacks and phishing attacks.