On the entertainment portal Watcher Guru, hackers created a fake post about a SWIFT and Ripple partnership, sparking a wave of discussion.
The Fake SWIFT and Ripple Post Incident
At 2:05 AM UTC on March 21, a fake update appeared on Watcher Guru’s X account claiming that SWIFT was finalizing a deal with Ripple to use XRP for global payments. The post suggested billions of XRP were locked in escrow to support this so-called partnership. It was deleted within minutes but was disseminated across Telegram, Discord, and Facebook through Watcher's automated system.
Attack Using a Fake X Link
On March 5, Watcher Guru received a Telegram message with a working x.com link pointing to one of their older posts. The team noticed it was from an X Developer staging site with a suspicious token string. Despite using the actual X domain, suspicions about malicious intent were clear. They reached out to @cstanley, X's head of cybersecurity, but received no response.
Aftermath for Ripple and XRP
Less than 48 hours after the fake post, a significant legal development for Ripple occurred: the SEC dropped its appeal against Ripple. This case had been ongoing since December 2020. Following the appeal's withdrawal, XRP's price jumped 11% to $2.52 on CoinGecko.
Watcher Guru has mitigated the attack's impact by changing account settings and removing fake content. They are currently awaiting X's response regarding the breach.
