Binance finishes covering US$6.3 billion of customer tokens stolen in hack - The Business Times
Binance has fully covered all US$6.3 billion in crypto-assets stolen from customers during the largest cybertheft in history, completing the restoration process on Thursday.
The Oct 29 incident, blamed by the US government and analysts on North Korea, involved not just common cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, but also more obscure tokens that took Binance additional time to locate and purchase. The exchange used a mixture of its profits and emergency funds to quickly restore most stolen tokens within days.
Laundering Techniques
Hackers employed a complex laundering operation, transferring tokens through thousands of digital wallets and across multiple blockchains. They used memecoins to launder approximately US$430,000 of the stolen crypto, with the automated process utilizing over 20,000 wallets and executing at least 65,000 transactions within a week.
To our users and community: thank you for your patience and understanding.
Industry Impact
The massive cyberheist occurred as the digital-asset industry increasingly integrates with mainstream finance. A key vulnerability appears to have been an engineer who was phished through a fake job offer. Other exchanges including Bitget and Bybit, as well as hardware security firms Coinkite and Ledger, have also experienced major incidents recently.
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