X sues UK duo over alleged $277K crypto account payout fraud

X, the social media platform that Elon Musk’s xAI artificial intelligence firm acquired for $33 billion last year, has filed a lawsuit in London against two UK residents, alleging that they defrauded the company through its Creator Revenue Sharing program.

According to the lawsuit, X Internet Unlimited Company and X Corp. claimed Vivek Kumar Sen, Zamyang Sherpa, and unidentified accomplices operated multiple X accounts in concert, using likes, reposts, and replies to mimic genuine engagement and increase their share of programme payouts.

The plaintiffs flagged nine accounts, including @Vivek4real_, @Bitcoin_Teddy, @saylordocs, @TrendingBitcoin, @Kalshibacktest, and @PolyBackTest. X alleges that several accounts posted identical or substantially similar crypto-focused content within minutes of one another, including one instance where posts appeared 11 seconds apart.

X also alleges the defendants used overlapping financial and identifying details across accounts. The filing says the Stripe account associated with @Bitcoin_Teddy was registered to “Stefan Mann,” while the linked bank account was held by Sen and the associated email address was linked to him.

X puts its claimed losses at £207,384 ($277,000) in program payments and is seeking at least another £75,000 ($100,000) for investigation, analysis, remediation, and measures to prevent further wrongdoing.

The Creator Revenue Sharing program began around July 28, 2023, and was replaced by X’s Original Content Rewards program on Sept. 7. X says it suspended the accounts on Aug. 18 over what it describes in the claim as “coordinated revenue-sharing fraud and platform manipulation.”

The allegations have not been adjudicated by the court.