Fake U.S. Treasury wallet dupes crypto community

Crypto influencers face backlash for amplifying a fraudulent U.S. Treasury XRP wallet, revealed to be a scam.

On Jan. 22, several large influencer accounts began posting about a U.S. Treasury XRP (XRP) wallet. The story quickly snowballed as it gained traction on X through reposts. Influencers either promoted the wallet or questioned its credibility. An on-chain analysis conducted through XRPSCAN has now revealed that the wallet is based in the Philippines.

The purported U.S. Treasury wallet, which is connected to major institutions, including Bank of America and JPMorgan, is fraudulent. The wallet address ‘rfHhX6hA54LBqA3j7r7EnCs6qyaRK2Lyfq’ is also KYC verified, which further bolstered people’s belief that it might be a legit source tied to the United States Treasury.

Now, many within the crypto community are voicing their concern. For instance, Zach Rynes, community coordinator of Chainlink, criticized so-called “crypto-influencers” for spreading rampant misinformation in the XRP community. 

He also explained that in 2021, there was a rumor that the Bank of America was executing all internal payments through Ripple. Crypto influencer David Stryzewski, who recently made the false claims about XRP being a Central Bank Digital Currency or CBDC, shared false information on Ripple in a podcast with Former U.S. Senate candidate John E Deaton.

Stryzewski, who is the CEO of Sound Planning Group, also distorted information that Ripple was located in Hong Kong, said Rynes.

Crypto scams on X are on the rise

The proliferation of crypto-related scams has only added to the confusion pervading the industry. There was an 87% spike in daily impersonation accounts in December 2024, according to Scam Sniffer, with numbers rising from an average of 160 in November to more than 300. 

Scam methods are also increasing—from phishing schemes to fake accounts, fraudsters are tampering with duped users on platforms like X.

Recently, Lenovo India and Yahoo News UK were among the big accounts that are having their handles hijacked to promote scam tokens and the losses are in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Further sophisticated phishing operations like those mimicking Zoom domains have lifted private keys and wallet credentials, exploiting trust and technical vulnerabilities in blockchain, making it all the more necessary for users to be on their guard.