Binance froze $4.2M of XRP from hack on Ripple co-founder’s wallet

Cryptocurrency exchange Binance froze $4.2 million worth of XRP from the $112 million hack on Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen’s personal wallet on Jan. 31, making it the largest hack of 2024 so far.

In a post on social media platform X, Binance CEO Richard Teng revealed that the exchange froze the address of the exploiter and thanked on-chain sleuth ZachXBT and the Ripple team for their coordination and help.

After finding out early on about the exploit that occurred at @Ripple , we’re happy to say that the #Binance team has managed to freeze $4.2 Million worth of $XRP stolen by the exploiter.

We appreciate both the communities efforts in flagging it to exchanges - as always @zachxbt …

— Richard Teng (@_RichardTeng) February 1, 2024

Thomas Silkjær, the head of analytics and compliance at the XRP Ledger Foundation, responded  to Teng’s post, claiming it was the foundation that first investigated the issue.

There was early speculation that Ripple was hacked, with some news claiming the XRP ( XRP ) token itself was hacked. However, Larsen later revealed that it was his personal accounts that were compromised, not Ripple itself.

The hacker behind the exploit didn’t use crypto mixer services or decentralized exchanges to hide their identity. Recently, most exploiters have stopped using centralized exchanges to avoid the possibility of funds being frozen.

ZachXBT later revealed  that the Ripple attribution for the affected account was tagged in XRP block explorers XRPScan and Bithomp as Ripple itself, leading to confusion about the hack.

Ripple co-founder Larsen revealed that some of his personal XRP accounts were compromised and 213 million XRP was stolen. Larsen also said Ripple is in talks with crypto exchanges to freeze the exploiter address and has informed law enforcement agencies.

Related: FTX to fully repay customers but not restart exchange, says lawyer

According to ZachXBT, the exploiters netted 213 million XRP worth about $112.5 million before attempting to launder the XRP through at least six different exchanges, including MEXC, Gate.io, Binance, Kraken, OKX, HTX and HitBTC.

While Binance has frozen some of the stolen funds, other crypto exchanges, including OKX and Kraken, have yet to reveal if they have identified or frozen any funds associated with the hack. Cointelegraph reached out to Binance and Ripple for further comments but did not receive a response by publication.

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