Unit 1 · Ledger basics

Who labels wallets, and how?

2 min read
3 sections
3 questions · +25 XP

The ledger has no owner names. Labels come from evidence such as addresses an exchange publishes itself, deposit and withdrawal records, and links between wallets. Weak evidence means "likely", not fact.

The ledger has no name field

An XRP Ledger address is just a string starting with r. Owners can fill in a domain field, but most big exchange wallets leave it empty.

So names like "Binance" or "Upbit" in explorers or on this site were added by someone collecting evidence. The ledger does not guarantee them.

The three strongest kinds of evidence

First, addresses an exchange publishes itself. OKX, for example, signs the sentence "I am an OKX address" with each XRP wallet’s key in its proof-of-reserves file. Only the owner can do that, so it is the strongest evidence.

Second, the deposit address an exchange app shows you. Third, the wallet that sends your withdrawal. In both cases the exchange is telling you directly.

Created by the same account does not mean same owner

A wallet comes into existence when someone first sends it XRP. An exchange’s withdrawal wallet effectively creates every new address its customers withdraw to, so its "children" include other exchanges and individuals.

So this site adds a "likely" label only when a wallet shares a creator with a confirmed exchange wallet and has exchanged XRP with it directly at least twice without a destination tag. Customer deposits usually carry a tag; internal moves usually do not.