Hackers Stole Over $40 Million of Bitcoin From Major Exchange Binance
One of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world has fallen victim to a robbery.
Binance, was the victim of hackers stealing over $40 million worth of bitcoin from the platform.
The exchange made the announcement on Tuesday and said that hackers stole 7,000 bitcoin and used a variety of methods to carry out the “large scale security breach.”
Binance said that it would cover the incident “in full” and no user funds will be affected.
The company also revealed that the hackers had been able to get some user information such as two-factor authentication codes, which are required to log in to a Binance account.
Binance said that the they were able to trace the stolen bitcoin to a single wallet.
“The hackers had the patience to wait, and execute well-orchestrated actions through multiple seemingly independent accounts at the most opportune time,” Binance stated.
“The transaction is structured in a way that passed our existing security checks. It was unfortunate that we were not able to block this withdrawal before it was executed. Once executed, the withdrawal triggered various alarms in our system. We stopped all withdrawals immediately after that.”
The hackers stole the bitcoin from the exchange’s “hot wallet,” which accounts for about 2% of its total bitcoin holdings.
Deposits and withdrawals on Binance’s platform will remain suspended but trading will still be allowed.