One of Turkey’s largest crypto exchanges, BtcTurk, suffered a cyberattack leading to unauthorized access to some of its hot wallets. The exchange has reported some level of asset loss, but it says it has sufficient financial stability to weather this setback.
$5.3 million recovered by BtcTurk, but how big is the loss?
In a recent status updateBtcTurk shared that its team detected that a hack had occurred on its platform on June 22, causing widespread concern within the crypto community.
Although the total amount lost was not disclosed, BtcTurk said that this incident only led to the compromise of hot wallets of 10 cryptocurrencies, while all cold wallets, which according to the Turkish exchange , hold the majority of its assets, remain safe.
Commenting on the incident, Richard Teng, CEO of Binance, announcement a collaborative investigative effort between the two exchanges leading to the recovery of $5.3 million in stolen assets.
Teng said:
Binance is assisting BtcTurk with its investigations and has so far frozen over $5.3 million in stolen funds.
Our investigation and security teams work around the clock as part of our proactive efforts to protect the ecosystem from bad actors. We will provide further updates as appropriate.
Meanwhile, the channel’s famous investigator ZachXBT has provided some information on the possible identity of the bad actors behind this hack.
According to ZachXBT, the hackers are likely affiliated with the address 0x327a81d0d128db8886d265be73c9fdda97194f30 which he observed recently transferring 1.96 million AVAX ($54.2 million) to Coinbase and THORChain, leading to a 10% drop in the price of ‘AVAX. ZachXBT has base his premonitions about BtcTurk having its AVAX market address on the Avalanche X channel.
For now, the Turkish stock exchange has neither confirmed nor denied this theory but all withdrawal and deposit transactions on the trading platform have been disabled. BtcTurk claims that the hack did not affect its strong financial position and assured all users of the safety of their assets.
2024 sees second Crypto Exchange hack – a growing cause for concern?
Cyberattack on BtcTurk represents second crypto exchange hack in 2024 after Japanese DMM Bitcoin Platform lost $305 million in BTC during a security breach in May.
Typically, hacks on crypto exchanges attract a lot of attention due to the custodial nature of these platforms which allows them to possess their customers’ private keys.
Additionally, these platforms are known to hold larger funds than their DeFi counterparts. For context, Coingecko reports that Binance, the world’s largest exchange, records 13 times the daily trading volume of the largest decentralized exchange, Uniswap.
Nonetheless, all forms of hacking or attack reinforce the need for continued, collaborative security advancements in the crypto ecosystem.
Featured image from WIRED, chart from Tradingview
