New York: Sam Curry, a staff security engineer at the Yuga Labs in the metro region of Omaha, in the US took to Twitter when he received an unexpected amount of $250,000 (approximately Rs 2 crore) from Google in to his account. Mr Curry shared a post on Twitter on Wednesday and wrote, “It’s been a little over 3 weeks since Google randomly sent me $249,999 and I still haven’t heard anything on the support ticket. Is there any way we could get in touch Google? (it’s OK if you don’t want it back…)”
In addition to that, while mentioning that it has been over three weeks since the transaction, he added that he hasn’t heard anything on the support ticket and sought suggestions to get in touch with Google regarding the matter. “It’s been a little over 3 weeks since Google randomly sent me $249,999 and I still haven’t heard anything on the support ticket. Is there any way we could get in touch with Google?”, the hacker tweeted.
It is pertinent to note that after getting such a bounty, he could have spent it all according to his wishes instead of going public. However, he decided to get in touch with the company and further confirm if they wanted the money back.
Eventually, his theory proved to be right and a team from Google confirmed that the amount was accidentally transferred to Sam Curry. According to NPR, a Google spokesperson has confirmed that a team accidentally made the payment to the wrong party further calling it a case of “human error”.
“We appreciate that it was quickly communicated to us by the impacted partner, and we are working to correct it. The company intended to get the money back”, the spokesperson added. Curry later told MarkeWatch he had been contacted by Google regarding the money.
In the meantime, the tweet went viral in no time as social media users were seen going into a frenzy over the huge amount of money. While some suggested that the user should not share it publicly, some also lauded the ethical behavior of the hacker.