Bitcoin traded in the $76,300 range on Thursday as Binance confirmed a security breach that the exchange estimates at $6.3 billion in total impact. The figure would place the incident among the largest cryptocurrency thefts on record.
Earlier in the session, bitcoin reached a 24-hour high of $81,890 before the selloff, as millions in leveraged long positions were liquidated.
In a post on X, the exchange said its initial investigation suggests the incident may involve a compromised DevOps engineer’s laptop. The attacker reportedly gained access to a service container and submitted unauthorized withdrawal transactions. The exchange said it has found no evidence of a wallet private key leak.
“The estimated total impact sits at around 6.3B. We have worked with blockchain partners to freeze affected assets, with ~3 billion frozen on-chain so far. Binance will cover all losses from the SAFU fund and the company’s funds. User funds are safe. We will also publish an updated Proof of Reserves once the remediation is complete,” Binance posted on X
The $6.3 billion estimate is higher than earlier figures, which ranged from $2.7 billion to $5.8 billion. The exchange said it has worked with blockchain partners to freeze affected assets, with about $3 billion frozen onchain so far.
“We will share a detailed technical post-mortem once the investigation is complete and the facts are verified,” the company said.
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino said earlier that the company froze more than 1.567 billion USDT, and Circle also froze USDC tied to the suspected attacker.
Co-founder Yi He wrote on X that user funds are safe and that Binance will cover all hacking losses. Concerns over a potential hack surfaced after a user noticed more than $2.7 billion in assets, including Ethereum and stablecoins issued by Tether and Circle, being moved from a Binance wallet to an external account under suspicious circumstances.
Binance suspends transactions
Deposits and withdrawals remain suspended while the exchange conducts security checks, freezes funds and works with law enforcement. The exchange said it has revoked the affected address authorization and is working to confirm the identities of those responsible.
Aave reportedly froze lending markets to block the suspected attacker from borrowing against the stolen funds. Binance.US said the incident does not affect its platform.
The company has not released a timeline for the full post-mortem. Until then, the exchange is asking users to rely only on official Binance channels for updates.
Changpeng Zhao, former CEO of Binance, tweeted on X during the exploit: “User funds are safe! It does look like a hack on Binance. Appreciate the quick freeze from [Tether and Circle]. I don’t manage Binance (.com) anymore, but as a shareholder, I expect all user funds will be fully covered.”
Bitcoin dropped to $76,301 as news of the hack was circulating. Bitcoin is currently trading near $77,800.