South Korean police have uncovered one of the country’s largest XRP-related cryptocurrency scams after arresting three suspects linked to a fake staking platform that promised fixed monthly returns.
Authorities say the scam withdrew about 3.4 million XRP from 71 victims, while blockchain tracking shows that total wallet flows associated with the operation reached 27.3 billion won (about $19 million).
How the fake XRP platform deceived investors
According to the Cyber Investigation Unit of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, the suspects created a fake website called Fxrpntwork.com between October 16 and 23, 2025, pretending to be the legitimate site. Luminous mesh and its FXRP ecosystem.
The platform promised investors guaranteed principal protection along with monthly mortgage returns of 1.5% to 1.8%.
To make the scheme appear real, the group flooded the Internet with fake promotional content via Naver and History blogs, Wikipedia pages, online news articles, and YouTube videos, some of which featured paid actors pretending to review the platform.
Police said the scammers deliberately launched the website around offering the real FXRP token to make their operation appear legitimate.
Instead of sending XRP directly from local exchanges, victims were directed to transfer their tokens through offshore exchanges before depositing them into wallets controlled by the scammers. This method helped avoid South Korea’s strict surveillance regulations for large cryptocurrency transfers.
After collecting approximately 3.4 million XRP, the operators shut down the site and disappeared.
Police have frozen $12 million, but part of the cryptocurrency is still missing
The investigation began after an offshore cryptocurrency exchange reported suspicious movements of XRP to South Korean authorities.
Using blockchain analysis, IP traces, domain registration records, and chat logs, investigators froze about 17.3 billion won ($12 million) in XRP and Tether across several overseas exchanges within three days of receiving the alert.
The authorities are now working through legal procedures to confiscate these assets and return them to the victims.
However, police said that nearly 10 billion won ($7 million) worth of cryptocurrencies had already been transferred before the freeze and were still missing.
One of the fugitive suspects faces an Interpol Red Notice
The police arrested Meanwhile, authorities obtained three suspects, an arrest warrant for a fourth suspect, believed to be abroad, and requested an Interpol Red Notice.
The two main suspects have been referred to prosecutors under South Korea’s Law on Aggravated Punishment for Certain Economic Crimes, while investigators continue to execute additional search warrants to identify others involved in promoting the scam and laundering stolen cryptocurrencies through OTC merchants.
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