Updated: Binance estimates its losses at ~$3B+, making this the largest exploit in crypto history — twice the size of 2025’s Bybit hack, now in second place. Binance blames a compromised devops laptop.
North Korea, also behind Bybit, is the suspected culprit.
@jmovs@mastodon.social Mt. Gox theft was ~650,000 BTC, which were priced at ~$370M at the time. It would be a considerably larger hack ($50B+) if you were valuing it based on today’s prices, though — depends on how you look at it, I suppose.
@molly0xfff@hachyderm.io an employee laptop able to exfiltrate billions on its own is gross negligence
@molly0xfff@hachyderm.io Not having followed it for a while Im really surprised crypto is still that big of a thing.
@molly0xfff@hachyderm.io So they hired a North Korean hacker? When you said $2b yesterday I was sure it had to be an inside job and this sounds like it.
@molly0xfff@hachyderm.io I remember the olden days where a guy just accidentally threw his hard drive with bitcoins in the bin.
We'll never learn how many of those ByeByeCoins would have been "donations" for el presidente de mar-a-lago, I guess 😏
@molly0xfff@hachyderm.io It'll be interesting to know who the victims were. Was it Binance directly or customer holdings?
If the former, they could probably cover the gap with some creative accounting.
If the latter, having to make everyone whole in short order to the tune of $3+B is a pretty big ask since it can't be as readily fudged and edgy customers may cause a run as soon as they regain access.
How can North Korea use the funds tho? I guess they will launder it and then cash it out, but wouldn’t it be traceable back to the stolen funds via the ✨blockchain✨? 🤔
@molly0xfff@hachyderm.io Soooo, now that they build a foolproof system where humans can't do anything to oversee or reverse any transactions… let me guess, the government needs to give them their money back?
@molly0xfff@hachyderm.io I mean sure, it could be North Korea.. But.. it could also be an inside job. Or could even be Trump-family adjacent.
@molly0xfff@hachyderm.io seems north korea is the only person who really has benefited from the crypto industry.