Jeffrey Huang, aka Machi Big Brother, has announced that he has withdrawn his defamation lawsuit, filed 2 months ago against on-chain investigator ZachXBT. ZachXBT has indicated that he will be returning the donations he received in support of his legal action.
Jeffrey Huang withdraws lawsuit against ZachXBT
2 months ago, we learned that on-chain investigator ZachXBT, who conducts extensive investigative work in the cryptocurrency ecosystem, was the subject of a defamation claim. By way of background, Jeffrey Huang, known by the pseudonym Machi Big Brother, sued ZachXBT over an article published in June 2022 in which he felt his reputation had been damaged.
This caused quite a stir, given that ZachXBT’s research actively helps to solve hacks and scams. It was for these “many services to the crypto community” that Jeffrey Huang announced on Monday evening that he had withdrawn his complaint. He also indicated that he appreciated the “significant changes” that the investigator has since made to his article:
I am withdrawing my defamation suit against @zachxbt
Zach has many times in the past been of great service to the crypto community and pursuing legal action against him was a last resort but not the right path.
I appreciate that Zach has made important amendments to his…
– Machi Big Brother (@machibigbrother) August 14, 2023
For his part, ZachXBT expressed his relief at the turn of events, although he deplored a lack of communication at the outset:
“While I’m disappointed that he went the legal route in the first place, I’m grateful that we’re able to find a solution. I would like to thank everyone in the community for their donations and support throughout the process. It meant a lot to me and made a huge difference. “
Donor reimbursement
At the time of the lawsuit, ZachXBT launched an appeal for donations to cover what were expected to be high legal costs. The appeal was a success, raising as much as $936,000.
Now that the case has been cut short, he has indicated that he will be able to return over 90% of the donations to those who supported him.
Donors on Solana and Pulse have already seen their funds returned. As for Ethereum, a smart claim contract will be put in place and all other donations on blockchains compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) will be returned manually during the week.
Since this announcement, donations on several EVM blockchains have already been returned:
Fantom, Arbitrum Nova, Polygon zkEVM, Harmony, Moonbeam, Gnosis donations all were manually refunded now.
– ZachXBT (@zachxbt) August 14, 2023
Afterwards, several people commented on the tweet, expressing their wish not to be reimbursed. ZachXBT pointed out that the Ethereum smart contract would be in effect for 12 months, after which the funds would not be returned.
