A real scandal erupted on the r/CryptoCurrency forum. User u/igetcuz said that the ChangeNOW crypto exchange has been holding his 2,995 USDC for over a year now. According to the post's author, the funds have been stuck since August 22, 2025. The most absurd part is that, to get his money back, he has already paid a certain "HYPE refund fee", gone through all KYC checks and wallet verification, but in return received only 44 empty emails apologizing for "system failures". The author even filed a complaint with the FSA, reminding the exchange that it claims to be "non-custodial".

The commenter's reaction was instant and harsh. According to user u/Fmarulezkd, the very idea of paying a fee to get your own money back sounds like complete nonsense. User u/davehax1 stated outright that this is a classic sign of a "pig butchering" scheme, where the victim is constantly hit with additional charges. Meanwhile, user u/Jeremiah_Vicious advised dropping the matter and going to the police, since the exchange is simply stalling for time.

However, an important technical detail surfaced in the comments. According to user u/Unicorn0718, in another subreddit the author himself admitted that he had sent the USDC on the wrong network. User u/Brave-Combination674 summed up the situation: the exchange legally seized on this mistake to withhold the crypto, but once the story gained publicity, it realized that $3,000 wasn't worth the reputational damage.

In the end, an official ChangeNOW account (u/ChangeNOW_Community) appeared in the thread. At first, they tried to hide behind standard excuses about AML and compliance, citing their own rules. But users quickly put them in their place. According to user u/Unicorn0718, you can't mess up this badly and then hide behind phrases about compliance. In the end, the exchange's representatives admitted that the deposit had been sent on the wrong network, which requires a complex recovery procedure, and stated that the issue had already been resolved in ticket #543598.