Binance creates smart contract to refund users affected by $3M rug pull

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Crypto exchange Binance has created an automated smart contract to reimburse users following the events of the Xirtam rug pull.

According to a Sept. 6 announcement, users affected by the Xirtam rug pull can receive their money by connecting their wallets to Etherscan, passing a verification check and calling the claim function through the contract address. Users must have submitted their applications by Aug. 2 to be eligible for recovery.

“We have received several reports of XIRTAM incidents and are fully aware of the seriousness of the problem,” the exchange previously wrote. It added: 

“An investigation has been launched and action has been taken immediately. The suspected fraudulent funds have been frozen in the Binance account. We appreciate your patience and understanding while we work to resolve this issue.”

Arbitrum-based Xirtam raised around 1,909 Ether (ETH), or $3.2 million, in user deposits in April through a series of funding rounds. Those involved two direct initial coin offerings and two community sales via the Fjord Foundry liquidity bootstrapping pools and SushiSwap liquidity pools.

In one instance, a scheduled Xirtam token initial airdrop offering (IAO) was canceled by Arbitrum-based decentralized exchange (DEX) AlienFi after discovering an undisclosed Xirtam seed sale well below the negotiated price. The IAO was canceled just five minutes before it was scheduled to begin. 

Immediately after raising capital, project owners orchestrated a rug pull that drained all assets from the Xirtam smart contract. However, all the funds were directly deposited onto Binance, prompting the exchange to freeze the stolen assets on May 4. No mixer or bridging service was used to launder the funds before their deposit onto Binance.

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