ChangeNOW Returns $100k to XRP Scam Giveaway Victims

Fraudsters ask users to send some amount of XRP promising that it will be doubled, collect the funds, and disappear. Sometimes they also ask to connect a wallet and enter the private keys, which is also followed by the theft of money. Although a transaction sent to scammers cannot be reversed, ChangeNOW does its best to help victims: if fraud is detected, we withhold the money that attackers are trying to launder using our service. Last year, we helped return $100,000 worth of XRP to rightful owners.

What Are XRP Scam Giveaways?

Fraudsters are good at making web pages that seem legit. These websites all look alike – featuring an interview of the Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse, offering a live support chat and other tools. The scam claims that you can send any amount of XRP and get 2X back right away. The address is provided – but of course, you will never get anything in return. Fake screenshots from “block explorers” show how the service “has doubled” XRP that the users have sent there.

An example of an XRP scam. Image source

If you simply copy the pay-in address and paste it into a real block explorer, you can see how dozens of people send their money and never get paid back – there are just no outcome transactions. Users lose thousands of XRP this way. You can carry out this basic check on your own, and this refers to both XRP scams and all crypto activities that promise rewards.

The problem with crypto scams is that no one, even Ripple Labs, can reverse a transaction made by mistake – even if they want to. Blockchain technology simply doesn’t allow this. Nevertheless, there is still a chance to return funds sent to fraudsters.

ChangeNOW Has Returned $100K Worth of XRP

In ChangeNOW, we have a risk management system monitoring all transactions that pass through our platform and indicating the suspicious ones. Whenever such an indicator is found, we analyze the transaction by numerous criteria. If they suggest that the payment comes from an illicit source, we suspend the transaction and ask the sender to prove their identity and the origin of funds.

In most cases, the system points to money transfers from addresses that are somehow associated with scams or other criminal activity. We can’t tell you more about how the system works, though — otherwise fraudsters will adapt to our criteria and bypass the monitoring.

The risk management system has helped us stop some of the XRP giveaway scam-associated transactions and return the funds to their owners. Here is the complete list of successful cases:

• March 2021 — 24999 XRP ($11800) returned upon a police request.
• April 2021 — 10000 XRP ($11700) go back to giveaway victims.
• November 2021 — 57231 XRP ($68100) saved and returned after another “giveaway”.
• December 2021— 10000 XRP ($8700) stopped and sent back to the owners.

Visit our Corporate Responsibility page to learn about other cases when ChangeNOW helped return money to scam victims.

How to Increase Your Chances to Return Money after an XRP Scam?

If you got scammed, report the case extensively so that more anti-money laudering systems mark the fraudster’s address as involved in criminal activity. One of the resources where you can report a giveaway scam is XRP Forensics. This platform can’t reverse your transactions, but it will blacklist malicious addresses and work with crypto exchanges to help find and freeze your money.

XRP Forensics. Image source

The platform will advise you to report the case to the police. Ripple works together with law enforcement and combines similar cases from different jurisdictions.

Once you report fraud to XRP Forensics, many exchanges and crypto swap platforms will flag the scammer’s wallet address and start taking action according to their anti-money laundering policies.

How Can ChangeNOW Help Me Return My Funds?

ChangeNOW’s risk management system constantly monitors the incoming transactions and freezes the funds that come from suspicious sources. Platforms like XRP Forensics help us do this job better by reporting addresses associated with scams.

If you’ve investigated your fraud case and suppose that the scammers may be using ChangeNOW to launder the money, contact our customer support. Describe in detail when, where, and how the fraudsters got your funds. Provide a hash of all relevant transactions, the pay-in address, and attach active links. Add the URL of the scam.

If the fraud is evident and we receive a report that the funds have reached our service, we will immediately freeze them. To return the money, we will need a request from law enforcement provided within 14 days after you submit the support ticket. Please report to the police as soon as possible so we can send the money back to you. The request from a law enforcement authority with a claim to return the funds and the transaction info should be sent to our email.

ChangeNOW does everything to protect users’ funds: we detect malicious wallet addresses, freeze suspicious funds; to make crypto a safer space, we blacklist addresses involved in scams and take other possible relevant measures. Sometimes we even receive such addresses from fraudsters themselves as they are trying to steal our money. We reviewed one such case to help our customers stay alert and never send crypto to unknown individuals.

The XRP scam giveaway case proves the old truth: if an offer seems too good to be true, it most likely is. ChangeNOW kindly recommends you avoid those who promise quick profits and do your due diligence for any other crypto activity that involves risk. If you need assistance or suppose you’ve spotted a scam, feel free to contact our customer support.