Binance ties roughly $6.3 billion crypto theft to a laptop
Original title: $6.3 Billion Stolen from Binance in Attack Attributed to North Korea
TRM and Chainalysis blame North Korea's TraderTraitor, while Binance says it has not identified who is responsible and will cover losses.
Binance says an initial review links a theft of about $6.3 billion to a compromised DevOps engineer's laptop that reached a service container and submitted unauthorized withdrawals. Co-CEO Richard Teng said it was not a one-click use of one engineer's permissions, that no wallet private keys were stolen, and that more breach points are still under investigation. Deposits and withdrawals were suspended, related permissions cancelled, and Binance says the SAFU fund and company money will cover losses. TRM, with high confidence, and Chainalysis attribute the theft to North Korea's TraderTraitor, also tracked as Lazarus Group and APT38; Binance has not named a culprit.
Unconfirmed: Stolen totals differ by source, and North Korean attribution is from TRM and Chainalysis, not Binance.
- TRM says about $6.36 billion left Binance wallets on ten blockchains on October 29, mostly in about 20 minutes from 20:05 UTC.
- Early tracking estimates ranged from about $3.55 billion to $5.8 billion before the roughly $6.3 billion figure.
- Issuers and Arbitrum froze about $2.7 billion; the attacker still holds more than 420,000 ETH and 18,270 BTC, about $2.4 billion.
- Chainalysis cited commingling with funds from last month's Bitget exploit and put the Binance figure at $6.4 billion.
Impact: Unauthorized crypto withdrawals of roughly $6.3 billion
- 1.Do not trust unofficial links, messages, or requests for Binance account information.
- ATT&CK
- T1078 Valid Accounts
- Threat actors
- TraderTraitorLazarus GroupAPT38
- Victims
- Binance
- Organizations
- TRMChainalysisTetherCircle
- Countries
- North Korea
From the original article
5 min read at securityaffairs.com
Binance links a $6. 3 billion crypto theft to a compromised DevOps laptop, with North Korean hackers blamed by blockchain analysts. Binance was investigating suspicious transfers that early estimates put at up to $5.
By Pierluigi Paganini · securityaffairs.com
A short excerpt; the article and its images belong to the publisher. Summary, key facts and assessment above are AI-written from the article and can be wrong.