AntPool Plans to Reimburse Record-Breaking $3.1 Million Fee

AntPool – a prominent Bitcoin mining pool – has announced its decision to refund the staggering $3 million transaction fee that made headlines last week.

The incident occurred when a user mistakenly submitted an 83 BTC gas fee, prompting AntPool’s risk control system to temporarily freeze the transaction during packaging.

AntPool to Reimburse 83 BTC Gas Fee

According to an update on November 30th, AntPool has set a deadline for the original owner to verify their identity before December 10, 2023, by contacting the mining pool.

To facilitate the refund process, the mining company has requested the user to prepare a signing tool, such as Electrum or Bitcoin Core, using the private key of the address associated with the transaction. The user must sign the message “AntPool” and send the signed text to the provided support email address.

The erroneous transaction, which set a new record with a $3.1 million fee, involved the transfer of 55.77 BTC with a pre-transaction balance of 139.42 BTC. The user overpaid by an astonishing 120,528 times, as reported by Bitcoin explorer Mempool.

The update from AntPool read,

“On November 23rd, some user submitted 83 BTC as a gas fee. The risk control system of ANTPOOL temporarily froze the fee when packaging the transaction. Please contact us before 00:00 (UTC+8) on December 10, 2023, and verify personal identity in the following way. After verification, ANTPOOL will refund the fee.”

Fat Finger: $500K in For a $2,000 BTC Transaction

This incident follows a similar occurrence in September, where a $500,000 fee was mistakenly paid, identified as a “fat finger” error. As reported earlier, an anonymous Bitcoin user transferred a whopping 19.89 BTC as transaction fees to execute the transfer of merely 0.074 BTC (which was then valued at less than $2,000).

F2Pool, the Bitcoin mining pool responsible for creating the valid block, received the payment and later agreed to reimburse the fee to the crypto services provider Paxos.