Crypto Exchange Livecoin Demanding ‘Ransom’ to Release 1 Mln Customer SHIFT Tokens

Cryptocurrency exchange Livecoin has “unexpectedly decided to delist SHIFT,” shared the Shift Community Project on twitter.

The delisting was the result of the cryptocurrency project undergoing an update. The blockchain-integrated IPFS storage and web hosting platform had its mainnet update released on Friday and asked the operators to update their nodes.

The Shift team has been providing support for properly updating the node to the latest version. Unlike the 100 nodes that updated v6.9.0, “not related to any migration,” without issue, Livecoin has been doing so for a week. In the event of being unable to update, it has now delisted the cryptocurrency.

“Dear clients, as it became known, the developers announced a migration to a different algorithm. Since SHIFT transactions are not currently executed, we cannot open withdrawal for this asset. The coin will be delisted soon. For all related questions, please contact the SHIFT developers,” reads the announcement Sept. 13, 2020, on Livecoin.

@livecoin_net announced today they are delisting $SHIFT. No prior warning and my tokens are now frozen. All that is required is a node update. @ShiftNrg engineers have offered to help. It is not a complex task. @coingecko and @CoinMarketCap please add a message to the $SHIFT page

— Gavin Wolfe Murray (@gavwolfemurray) September 13, 2020

Shift team wants the exchange to allow its holders to withdraw their funds, which are reportedly 1 million coins, worth around $350k at the current SHIFT price of $0.35.

“No one cannot stop you from delisting SHIFT. But not allowing ample time for your customers to withdraw their property is theft. Do better,” wrote SHIFT on Twitter.

@livecoin_net Seriously? you lock funds and close market without warning, then announce delist without letting users withdraw? That's theft of 1M coins. Now you ask a BTC payment to unlock our funds. That's a ransom. #CryptoScams #CryptoNews @Cointelegraph @ShiftNrg #DPoS

— PNWdrew (@PNWDrew) September 14, 2020

As per the screenshot shared by the Shift team on twitter, on Shift community’s plea, the exchange has decided to allow the withdrawals but, in return, has asked the team for a payment of 0.5 BTC, worth about $5,100 at the current BTC price, for its technical troubles.

In another follow-up response, the exchange reduced the withdrawal fee from 0.5 BTC to 0.2 BTC (worth over $2k), with an increase in trading fees to 0.24% after receiving complaints from the Shift community.

In response to the “ransom demands,” the Shift team has agreed to pay 0.2 BTC as a “relisting fee,” but only after withdrawals for “nearly 1 million SHIFT coins” have been opened.

“Another example of why we cannot trust centralized exchanges,” wrote SHIFT.

Shift Live Price