Xrplorer: An elaborate phishing scam is attempting to steal the private key of XRP users

By Selena On Jun 16, 2020

According to cryptocurrency analysts at Xrplorer, scammers are trying to convince victims that Ripple is giving a token; After that, they will steal the private keys of XRP users. The fraudsters have reportedly sent extremely small amounts of XRP to different addresses on the XRP ledger.

Xrplorer: Elaborate XRP scam claims Ripple giving away 3,000,000,000 XRP

The Xrplorer report stated:

“Starting February 1, 2020, Ripple is releasing 3 Billion XRP to incentivize network users. Get 25% more XRP added to your account balance in just minutes.”

According to Ripple, their goal is to direct users to links that provide a great advertising offering. For the time being, the site doesn’t look legal. But, the crooks use copies of websites familiar to XRP investors to lure victims into giving out their account information and private keys.

The knock-off sites use homoglyph domains that swap the characters of the official domains with similar-looking characters from different scripts to deceive users. For example, since a Greek Ο, Latin O, and Cyrillic О look similar but have different codes, they could be used to generate a spoofed web domain.

The report stated:

“The entire heist operation is an elaborate setup with messages sent to XRP accounts based on their holdings, homoglyph domains, fake but trustworthy marketing material, tools to collect secret keys that also checks the balance on the XRPL and much more.”

Fraudsters are also now emailing individuals who may be interested in cryptocurrencies. As of June 15, they stole 2,100,000 XRP. Xrplorer said it also laundered 1,980,000 XRP mainly through cryptocurrency exchange ChangeNOW and CoinSwitch.

BITMAX: Japanese crypto holders may prefer to hold XRP

According to the results of a survey from cryptocurrency exchange BITMAX, 25% of the 1,498 people surveyed said XRP was their favorite coin, compared to 26% who preferred BTC. Ethereum came in third at 9%. Meanwhile, Bitcoin is nearly as popular as the XRP token among traders in Japan

#推し暗号資産結果発表?

?1位は #ビットコイン ?#リップルも僅差でした。

その他でも色々教えてくれたので
上位６つをご紹介?

BITMAXスタッフの推しは
みなさんと少し違いましたよ?

1,498件も投票をいただいて
とても嬉しいソーシャル担当です?

ありがとうございました！#BTC pic.twitter.com/M5tQ6DACZK

— BITMAX (@BITMAX_JP) June 12, 2020

However, the Japan Virtual Currency Exchange Association (JVCEA) reported similar findings in December 2019. XRP was second behind BTC among the number of Yen-denominated digital asset holdings, with ETH also in third.

Read more: