- Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen has been hacked reportedly losing 213 million XRP
- Larsen said the unauthorized access to some of his XRP accounts happened on January 30
- The Ripple executive has disclosed that he has involved law enforcement agencies
Hackers in the web3 space continue to knock on crypto wallets’ doors with Ripple co-founder and executive chairman Chris Larsen being the latest victim. Larsen confirmed that there was unauthorized access to his XRP accounts on January 30, adding that he has already involved law enforcement agencies. Although he didn’t reveal how much he lost, blockchain sleuth ZachXBT posted on X (formerly Twitter) that the hacker stole 213 million XRP valued at over $100 million.
Hacked Wallets Belong to Ripple?
Apart from involving the police, Larsen noted that he’s also working with exchanges, adding that a significant amount of the funds have been frozen. According to ZachXBT, the malicious actor moved the funds through different exchanges including Binance, MEXC and Kraken.
It appears @Ripple was hacked for ~213M XRP ($112.5M)
Source address
rJNLz3A1qPKfWCtJLPhmMZAfBkutC2QojmSo far the stolen funds have been laundered through MEXC, Gate, Binance, Kraken, OKX, HTX, HitBTC, etc pic.twitter.com/HKGYsLQeMv
— ZachXBT (@zachxbt) January 31, 2024
Larsen clarified that the hacker accessed his personal accounts and not those of Ripple with a community note on ZachXBT’s X post noting that “Ripple wallets remain secure. No Ripple-managed wallets [were] compromised.”
This is an isolated incident, and Ripple wallets are secure / were never compromised. We’ve confirmed nearly all the affected funds were converted out of XRP.
We’re working with law enforcement and have been advised that a significant portion of funds have been frozen, and are…
— Chris Larsen (@chrislarsensf) January 31, 2024
The on-chain sleuth seemed to disagree with the note saying that “XRP block explorers” identified the compromised addresses as belonging to “the entity Ripple.”
The Ripple attribution for the rJNLz3A account was tagged in XRPScan and Bithomp (XRP block explorers) as the entity Ripple.
Funny how the community note leaves out that Chris Larsen is the Ripple co-founder and executive chairman. pic.twitter.com/rLnVxwKfPK
— ZachXBT (@zachxbt) February 1, 2024
Another Executive Targeted
Larsen isn’t the first executive in the web3 space to be targeted by malicious actors. In January last year, for example, the COO of Nike-acquired RTFKT Nikhil Gopalani lost over $173,000 worth of NFTs in a hack.
Apart from directly hacking crypto wallets, malicious actors are also opting to hack blockchain projects’ social media accounts and directing followers to a wallet drainer. Rocket Pool is the latest to fall for this trick with its X account’s hacker directing followers to a wallet drainer.
With Larsen’s hacker already moving the funds, it’s to be seen whether the police and exchanges will manage to freeze all the funds and nab the attacker.
