Binance said Sunday it had resumed allowing users to withdraw funds three days after freezing assets in response to a cyberattack. The world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange reported an initial spike in withdrawals totaling $3.64 billion before activity stabilized, equal to 2.1% of the $171 billion in assets it manages.
Thursday’s hack involved $6.3 billion in digital coins and appears to be the biggest crypto heist to date. Binance said it would cover all losses from the incident and had worked with other cryptocurrency firms to freeze about $3 billion of the stolen assets. In a social media post, the company said its team was still testing remaining networks and assets and that market conditions were stable.
Cybersecurity analysts and the FBI have attributed the attack to North Korea, which has targeted cryptocurrency companies for years by exploiting vulnerabilities in their infrastructure. Crypto analytics firm Chainalysis said the attackers may have used artificial intelligence to speed up the operation, processing thousands of transactions in a short period.
Once transactions resumed, users deposited $1.01 billion and withdrew about $4.65 billion, Binance said, with most activity occurring in the first few hours. Co-founder Changpeng Zhao said in a post on X that trust is earned through actions in hard times rather than words in good times, and thanked users for their trust.
Sources: The New York Times Business.