{"id":83648,"date":"2023-08-28T12:26:13","date_gmt":"2023-08-28T09:26:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/?p=83648"},"modified":"2025-09-12T12:28:13","modified_gmt":"2025-09-12T09:28:13","slug":"pepe-developer-accuses-former-team-members-of-15-million-theft","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/pepe-developer-accuses-former-team-members-of-15-million-theft\/","title":{"rendered":"Pepe developer accuses former team members of $15 million theft"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The only remaining developer of the Pepe (PEPE) meme token <a href=\\\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/pepecoineth\/status\/1695267128428114005?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\\\">\u0440\u0430\u0441\u0441\u043a\u0430\u0437\u0430\u043b<\/a> that behind the theft of 16 trillion coins (~$15 million) are three former members of the project&#8217;s team.<\/p>\n<p>\\n\\n\\n\\n<\/p>\n<p>On August 25, on-chain researchers noted that<a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/what-is-a-multisignature-what-is-a-ring-signature\"> multisignature<\/a> wallet PEPE <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/pepe-falls-20-amid-scam-suspicions\">reduced<\/a> the number of required confirmations from 5 to 2 and transferred part of the assets to decentralized exchanges OKX, Binance, KuCoin and Bybit.<\/p>\n<p>\\n\\n\\n\\n<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\\\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\\\"><p>\\n<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSince its creation, PEPE has, unfortunately, suffered from internal strife, as part of the team are saboteurs driven by big egos and greed. Conflicts occurred frequently, and most of those who participated in creating the coin began distancing themselves a week after launch,\u201d the developer said.<\/p>\n<p>\\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>\\n\\n\\n\\n<\/p>\n<p>The project representative apologized for the incident and noted that now only he controls the token&#8217;s smart contracts. According to him, PEPE will be fully decentralized in the coming months.<\/p>\n<p>\\n\\n\\n\\n<\/p>\n<p>The stolen coins amount to about 4% of the total supply, and about 10 trillion PEPE remain in the multisig wallet. These tokens will be moved to a new address where they will be safely stored until there is a need for their use or burning,&#8221; the programmer explained.<\/p>\n<p>\\n\\n\\n\\n<\/p>\n<p>The developer also assured that the project&#8217;s assets and its X account (formerly Twitter) are safe.<\/p>\n<p>\\n\\n\\n\\n<\/p>\n<p>Against the backdrop of the alleged fraud, the price of PEPE fell by almost 20%. At the time of writing, the coin was still trading at $0.00000087.<\/p>\n<p>\\n\\n\\n\\n<\/p>\n<figure class=\\\"wp-block-image size-large\\\"><img loading=\\\"lazy\\\" decoding=\\\"async\\\" width=\\\"1024\\\" height=\\\"436\\\" src=\\\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/PEPEUSDT_2023-08-28_12-09-57-1024x436.png\\\" alt=\\\"PEPEUSDT_2023-08-28_12-09-57\\\" class=\\\"wp-image-214493\\\" srcset=\\\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/PEPEUSDT_2023-08-28_12-09-57-1024w.png 1024w, https:\/\/forklog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/PEPEUSDT_2023-08-28_12-09-57-300x128.png 300w, https:\/\/forklog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/PEPEUSDT_2023-08-28_12-09-57-768x327.png 768w, https:\/\/forklog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/PEPEUSDT_2023-08-28_12-09-57-1536x654.png 1536w, https:\/\/forklog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/PEPEUSDT_2023-08-28_12-09-57-2048x872.png 2048w\\\" sizes=\\\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\\\" \/><figcaption class=\\\"wp-element-caption\\\">Hourly chart of PEPE\/USDT on Binance. Data: <a href=\\\"https:\/\/www.tradingview.com\/chart\/95fTfTYT\/?symbol=BINANCE%3APEPEUSDT\\\">TradingView<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\\n\\n\\n\\n<\/p>\n<p>In April, PEPE rose tenfold, <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/pepe-price-rally-turns-meme-token-holders-into-millionaires\"> turning some holders of the asset into millionaires<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\\n\\n\\n\\n<\/p>\n<p>In May, users deposited $46 million onto exchanges <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/investors-pour-46-million-into-pepe-meme-token-on-exchanges-in-24-hours\"> in the meme token<\/a>. Experts warned at the time about the risks of a dump for the coin.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The only remaining developer of the Pepe (PEPE) meme token said that behind the theft of 16 trillion coins (~$15 million) are three former members of the project team.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":83649,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"select":"1","news_style_id":"1","cryptorium_level":"","_short_excerpt_text":"","creation_source":"","_metatest_mainpost_news_update":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1161,1246],"class_list":["post-83648","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-memes","tag-scammers"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"views":"40","promo_type":"1","layout_type":"1","short_excerpt":"","is_update":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83648","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83648"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83648\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83650,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83648\/revisions\/83650"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83648"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83648"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83648"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}