The $15B XRP ‘transfer’ is part of a reported failed exploit attempt.
A January 14 transaction of nearly $15 billion worth of XRP (XRP) from an unknown wallet to Bitfinex did not go through and was part of a failed “partial payments exploit” attempt, Bitfinex Chief Technology Officer Paolo Arduino said.
The transfer was initially highlighted by blockchain tracker X's (formerly Twitter) account Whale Alert, which transferred 25.6 billion XRP – about half of XRP's billion circulating supply – from an anonymous wallet to Bitfinex.
However, Whale Alert later deleted the post and said it was a “difficulty reading the Ripple node's response correctly, which resulted in a few incorrect posts.”
Arduino continued on X: “Someone tried to attack Bitfinex with a ‘partial payments exploit,' and the attacker mistakenly configured the software to process partial payments by guessing the exchange.”
Someone tried to attack @bitfinex with a “partial payments exploit”. The attack failed because Bitfinex handles the ‘delivered_amount' data field properly.https://t.co/EiGw9UQmmq
(Updated with better gif) pic.twitter.com/DxOnJLLkhU
— Paolo Ardoino (@paoloardoino) January 14, 2024
The partial payments exploit works by assuming that a company has an improperly configured system that only reads the XRP transaction amount field, which is set at large.
Related: Hong Kong Virtual State Consortium Removes XRP from Global Crypto Indices
In fact, exploitation sends a very small amount above the specified amount in another transaction field and wants to receive credit for the difference.
But Arduino says the attack failed because “Bitfinex handled the ‘received_amount' data field properly.”
According to blockchain data, the attacker tried to attack Binance on the transfer of 58.9 billion XRP, but it also failed.
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