TLDR
- Binance says a hack cost it about $6.3 billion, the largest crypto theft on record.
- About $3 billion has been frozen, including more than $2.3 billion in USDT and USDC.
- An early probe points to a compromised DevOps engineer’s laptop, with no sign of a private key leak.
- Binance says it will cover all losses with its SAFU fund and company money.
- Bitcoin fell 4.8% to below $77,000, and security firms say North Korea is the likely culprit.
Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange by volume, said attackers stole about $6.3 billion in assets on Thursday. Security experts call it the biggest crypto hack in history.
The exchange said about $3 billion of the affected assets have been frozen. That includes more than $2.3 billion in USDT and USDC stablecoins.
Tether froze over $1.57 billion in USDT. Circle froze over $800 million in USDC.
Binance co-CEO Yi He said the exchange will cover all hacking losses. It will use its Secure Asset Fund for Users, which holds about $1 billion in bitcoin, along with company funds.
Binance founder Changpeng Zhao said user funds are safe. He added that he expects all funds to be fully covered.
How the Hack Happened
Binance’s early investigation points to a compromised laptop that belonged to a DevOps engineer. The exchange said this may have let an attacker reach a service container and submit unauthorized withdrawals.
Binance said it found no evidence of a wallet private key leak. It plans to publish a detailed technical report once the facts are verified.
Security firm Blockaid said the attacker bundled 50 EIP-7702 authorizations into one transaction. One matched the account’s required nonce, so it was accepted.
Blockaid CEO Ido Ben-Natan called the attack “very, very similar” to the February 2025 Bybit hack. He said attribution to any group remains unconfirmed.
TRM Labs said it traced the attack to a North Korean group called TraderTraitor with “high confidence.” Investigator ZachXBT named the Lazarus Group as the likely attacker.
Binance has not named the attackers. It says it is working with law enforcement to identify them.
Market Reaction and Recovery
Bitcoin fell 4.8% to below $77,000 after the news. Ether dropped 5.7%.
BNB, the token of the Binance-linked BNB Chain, fell 8%. AAVE fell 11%.
Arkham data showed the hacker’s wallets once held more than $5.7 billion. The funds were later seen moving through the Uniswap exchange.
The attacker also borrowed at least 20,000 wrapped ether, worth about $44 million, on Aave. Stolen USDT was used as collateral.
Binance held about $144 billion in assets before the hack, according to DefiLlama. The stolen funds equal roughly 4% of that.
Binance has paused deposits and withdrawals during security checks. Yi He expects withdrawals to reopen within 48 hours, and the exchange plans to publish an updated Proof of Reserves.
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