Bitget Hacked for $387M, Phishing Schemes Target Coinbase and Vietnam
Crypto exchange Bitget reported a massive hack on September 24, with an attacker transferring approximately $387.5 million from some of its online wallets. The attacker manipulated transaction information and triggered Bitget's approval process to move the funds, according to CEO Gracy Chen. The stolen assets included ether and several other cryptocurrencies.
Bitget's protection fund, currently worth over $464 million, covers the loss. Security firms Mandiant and SlowMist are assisting in the investigation. The company is still working to determine how the attacker entered its system.
A separate phishing scheme in the United States resulted in a $16 million loss for about 100 Coinbase users. The perpetrator, Ronald Spektor, was sentenced to four to 12 years in prison for running the scheme, which involved impersonating a Coinbase representative and persuading victims to transfer cryptocurrency to wallets controlled by Spektor.
Another case involved a Vietnamese man, Trung Nguyen Van, who was charged with money laundering in connection with a scam that cost one victim about $16 million in cryptocurrency. The scheme involved a romance scam, in which fraudsters build trust with people online before persuading them to invest in fake cryptocurrency platforms.