Seoul Metropolitan Police put a figure on the XRP staking scam that ran out of a copycat Flare Network site last October. Victims handed over 3.4 million XRP, about 12.3 billion won or $8.5 million, across eight days. Seventy-one people filed complaints. That $8.5 million led almost every write-up on Thursday. It is the smallest number in the case file.
Detectives followed 27.3 billion won, near $19 million, through the wallets tied to the operation. Against 12.3 billion won of confirmed deposits, that leaves a 15 billion won gap nobody has explained.
A 15 billion won gap sits between deposits and traced flow
Two readings fit. Police say they expect victims who never came forward, which would make 71 a floor, not a total. The duller reading is accounting: money pushed through a chain of wallets gets tallied more than once, and traced flow carries a different meaning from deposits. Neither version has a public answer yet.
The distinction matters for restitution. Prosecutors work from proven losses, and the XRP staking scam hands them a smaller number than the wallet trail. A Korean court-ordered asset freeze runs on evidence of harm, not on how much crypto passed through an address.
Eight days online, nine months to the charges
The fake domain, Fxrpntwork.com, opened on 16 October 2025 and went dark on 23 October. Flare had shipped the real FXRP product weeks earlier, so the copy had something genuine to point at.
Then came the marketing. Naver and Tistory posts, Wikipedia edits, fabricated news stories, YouTube testimonials from paid actors. The offer: 1.5% to 1.8% a month, principal protected. Compounded, the top of that range lands near 24% a year. A fixed monthly rate next to a promise that nobody can lose money is what gives these sites away. It slowed deposits not at all.
Nine months passed between the site going dark and the police laying out the case. These files move slowly, and sentences land hard once they do, as a Texas court showed with 23 years for a $20 million coin scheme.
Seoul locked 17.3 billion won in 72 hours
Police reached the overseas exchanges fast and froze 17.3 billion won, near $12 million, in XRP and Tether. Roughly 10 billion won, near $7 million, had already moved. Investigators still cannot place it. Speed decides these cases. A WEMIX attacker minted $5.2 million and got only $724,000 off the chain, the same arithmetic from the other side.
Two men, both 29, now sit with prosecutors. A third stayed abroad and carries an Interpol Red Notice. A 34-year-old who appeared in the promotional videos faces a separate fraud charge.
The 71 named victims averaged about 173 million won each, near $119,000, outside the usual retail dust. Whether they see any of the frozen 17.3 billion won depends on the exchanges holding it and on a Korean court. The 10 billion won that left early will decide how much of the XRP staking scam turns into a recovery.
