X sues its own users for running a fake bitcoin news bot farm

X is suing two men for allegedly building a network of fake bitcoin news accounts to farm payouts from X’s own creator fund.

The lawsuit names Vivek Kumar Sen and Zmyang Sherpa as the alleged masterminds behind the scheme, with law firm Lewis Silkin LLP representing the platform. At stake is at least 207,000 pounds ($277,000) in disputed creator-fund payouts. Costs for further damages from investigations and remediation are still unquantified.

The lawsuit named nine accounts as part of the alleged network: @Vivek4real_, @Bitcoin_Teddy, @saylordocs, @TrendingBitcoin, @Kalshibacktest, @PolyBackTest, @BTC_Vibes, @MrSuperBitcoin and @Laserlump. These accounts circulated fake “breaking” news headlines that often matched word for word and appeared on X just seconds apart.

Most of these posts made unsubstantiated, unverified claims involving big players in finance to draw mass attention, such as claiming Goldman Sachs' CEO was pushing a crypto bill or saying Citibank had bought $12.6 million in bitcoin.

The lawsuit further alleges that defendants operated accounts that repeatedly liked, replied to, and reposted these posts to create a facade of false engagement.

The @Vivek4real_ handle appeared to expand the scheme by offering paid engagement and manipulation services to third parties, soliciting the purchase of additional high-follower accounts. The lawsuit cites a message in which Sen allegedly wrote to a third party about buying their account: "Can we continue on another channel, please, as you haven't enabled encrypted chat and I don't want us to get in trouble for something X doesn't allow. If you understand what I mean."

X terminated all accounts linked to this network on Aug. 18 on grounds of “coordinated revenue sharing fraud and platform manipulation.”

These accounts received payments through shared Stripe accounts with mismatched names and were linked by shared devices and login identifiers. For instance, one account’s Stripe payment details were registered to “Stefan Mann,” while the linked bank account and email address were in Sen’s name.

X now wants the creator payout money back, along with damages for fraud and conspiracy. X’s Senior Legal Directors, Diego de Lima Gualda and Adam Mehes, signed the particulars of the claim.