Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, suffered a massive cyberattack last week, resulting in the theft of approximately $6.3 billion worth of assets in just 20 minutes. The FBI has attributed the attack to TraderTraitor, a North Korean state-sponsored hacking group also known as Lazarus, which previously targeted Bybit in a $1.5 billion heist last year.
Binance’s co-founder and co-CEO, Yi He, discovered the breach while scrolling through X at her home in Abu Dhabi. The exchange’s security and wallet teams quickly mobilized a global war room of about 100 people to mitigate the damage. Yi He acknowledged that Binance could have invested more in security earlier but vowed to strengthen measures moving forward.
The company has covered 95% of the losses for affected customers, using funds from its Secure Asset Fund for Users, Futures Insurance Fund, and corporate treasury to purchase $6 billion in replacement tokens. The remaining 5% consists of less liquid assets, which may take longer to recover. Binance resumed withdrawals in phases, initially covering 15 tokens, including Bitcoin, Ether, and Dogecoin.
Following the resumption of withdrawals, Binance customers withdrew assets worth $3.64 billion, equivalent to 2.1% of the exchange’s assets under management, which stood at $171 billion as of October 28. This incident marks the largest cybersecurity breach in history, highlighting the ongoing threats faced by cryptocurrency exchanges.