Hackers steal $6.3 billion from Binance in record heist attributed to North Korea

Hackers stole $6.3 billion from Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, in what analysts say could be the biggest financial theft in history. For high-risk payment operators, the useful part is not the spectacle; it is the operational response: withdrawals were suspended, stablecoin issuers froze part of the proceeds, and law enforcement got involved fast.

1. The theft was discovered after attackers drained Binance wallets and moved the funds into wallets under their control. According to the report, most of the robbery was carried out in about 20 minutes late on Thursday, and the method resembled previous large attacks attributed to North Korea.
2. Binance suspended withdrawals and said it would use its own resources to cover the losses. The company said customer funds were safe and that it was working with partners to freeze part of the affected assets; about $3 billion had been located so far.
3. Stablecoin issuers, including Tether, based in El Salvador, and World Liberty Financial, backed by Trump, froze close to half of the stolen assets. Binance also said it was working with the FBI and the US Secret Service, according to a person familiar with the situation who spoke to Reuters.
4. On Friday, Binance said it expected to resume withdrawal services within the next 48 hours, but it did not say what would happen to the remaining $3.3 billion. The company said it had internally set aside about $6.34 billion from its own funds to cover the losses, without giving details on the source of that capital.
5. Binance’s website says it has a $1 billion bitcoin reserve fund intended to protect customer assets in case of security failures. Binance founder Changpeng Zhao also said on X that the company owns more than $1 billion worth of SpaceX shares.

US-based blockchain firms TRM Labs and Chainalysis said the attack had strong similarities to other major incidents previously attributed to North Korea. Elliptic also said it believed North Korea was behind the theft, calling it “almost certainly” the largest known theft of any kind.