The Binance hack is way bigger than any other known heist in the crypto world - Yahoo Finance
Crypto exchange Binance reported a theft estimated at $6.3 billion, the largest in crypto history, causing market turmoil and forcing temporary suspension of customer withdrawals.
The estimated $6.3 billion theft reported by crypto exchange Binance isn't the first time the industry has faced major incidents freezing large customer assets and spurring crypto stock declines. This hack has rattled markets, with Bitcoin and other digital assets sinking over the past 24 hours. Binance has temporarily suspended customer withdrawals while outside investigators track the stolen funds.
Historic Scale
The Binance hack towers over previous major crypto thefts in scale. Nearly $1.5 billion was stolen from Bybit in February 2025 by North Korean-linked hackers who manipulated transaction approvals. The Ronin Network lost $625 million in March 2022 when its security was compromised, with US authorities attributing the attack to North Korea's Lazarus Group.
Poly Network lost $611 million in August 2021 when an attacker exploited a vulnerability, though the funds were mostly returned. An unconfirmed $3.5 billion theft from Chinese mining pool LuBian in December 2020 would have been the second-largest before Binance's breach.
Industry Response
Binance stated it has successfully frozen 44% of stolen funds with help from stablecoin issuers and will cover all losses from the incident. This echoes the turbulence seen with FTX's collapse in 2022, where founder Sam Bankman-Fried was later convicted of fraud and sentenced to 25 years in prison.
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