The Ruling on Riba (Usury or Interest) Profits Taken in Ignorance and How to Dispose of Them

The questioner:
Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success. He says: A person took riba (usury or interest) profits on his money in exchange for saving it, and he was not aware of their prohibition until after he had taken them as savings.

The Shaykh:
Riba (usury or interest) is what they call savings, and it is riba (usury or interest). This is not hidden, so he should not take it. He does not take it; he takes only his principal, and he does not return to saving.

The questioner:
Then he says, may Allah preserve you: What is the way to dispose of it?

The Shaykh:
To dispose of it, if some riba (usury or interest) reaches you without your intending it or knowing about it, or if you initially took it out of greed and then repented to Allah the Exalted, and you have accumulated money from riba (usury or interest), you dispose of it by placing it in a general project that people benefit from, such as lost money that has no owner. Not as charity, and not as lost money that you are getting rid of. Yes.