Over the past few weeks, dozens of citizens of El Salvador have taken to Twitter to complain about the mysterious loss of funds from their Chivo wallets. In September, El Salvador‘s government accepted Bitcoin as legal tender, and it awarded fractional amounts of Bitcoin – approximately worth $30 – to all citizens who signed up for the government’s preferred digital wallet Chivo.
In mid-December, Twitter user @_elcomisionado_ created a thread comprising dozens of examples of tweets from people claiming losses from their Chivo wallets that range between $61 to $16,000. The total amount of the consolidated losses exceeded $96,000. This translated post from Twitter user @designvbt was one of the largest purported losses, equivalent to more than $16,000.
Another 131 complaints of identity theft were reported over the last week, bringing the total number of formal complaints to more than 880, said Zaira Navas, an attorney and victim.
“We represent a group of people who reported to our digital platform, but there are many other people who went to the Prosecutor‘s Office on their own or to the company’s headquarters to complain,” Navas said after bringing the cases to the Attorney Generals office, La Prensa Grafica reported.
El Salvador is the first country to adopt Bitcoin as a legal tender and President Nayib Bukele plans to build a Bitcoin city funded by $1 billion in Bitcoin bonds. He has been promoting Bitcoin adoption since June and recently announced the government owns 1,391 Bitcoin. However, there has not been an official response yet from the El Salvadoran government nor Chivo wallet regarding the pending lawsuit nor purported Bitcoin losses.
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