Mystery of the Missing $150 Million XRP Solved! Was Ripple's Founder Hiding the Truth?

According to cryptocurrency detective ZachXBT, Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen reportedly lost approximately 150 million dollars worth of cryptocurrency after storing his private keys with password manager LastPass.

In a post published today, ZachXBT confirmed that a US law enforcement agency's seizure request stemmed from the security breach of Larsen's wallet in January 2024 due to the compromise of private keys stored in LastPass. The password manager had suffered a major security breach in 2022, and it was alleged that hackers exploited this breach to steal sensitive user data.

On the ZachXBT Telegram channel, "A seizure request made by US law enforcement yesterday revealed that the reason for the hacking of Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen's wallet by ~150 million dollars in January 2024 was due to the private keys being stored in LastPass," and added, "Up to this point, Chris Larsen had not disclosed the reason for the theft to the public."

Larsen had previously acknowledged 'unauthorized access' to personal XRP accounts, but did not specify how the breach occurred. Larsen's admission followed previous reports claiming that ZachXBT was hacked for approximately 213 million XRP, which was valued at 112.5 million dollars at the time by Ripple.

However, in the confiscation document shared by ZachXBT, Larsen's name is not clearly mentioned or the stolen amount is not fully confirmed. The uncertainty remains on how the figure of 283 million XRP, currently worth about 708 million dollars, was determined.