Binance covers 90% of $6.3bn assets stolen in record hack
· Technology · BBC News, Reuters, LiveMint
Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, has covered 90% of the $6.3bn in assets stolen during a hack on Thursday, the company said on Saturday. The remaining 10% may take longer to source in the required amounts, though Binance has pledged to cover 100% of total losses and set aside over $6.34bn from its own funds. The cryptocurrencies bitcoin, ethereum, Tether, and seven other widely-traded assets are fully covered, the exchange added. Binance aims to resume user withdrawals on Sunday, 1 November, and said it has frozen around $3bn of stolen assets since the incident. The hack, suspected to be the largest in crypto history, was carried out by multiple people using sophisticated methods to obscure their tracks. The US Secret Service and blockchain analytics firms have linked the attack to a North Korean state-backed group, though North Korea has denied involvement.
Why it matters
Binance users face the immediate impact of a major security breach, but the exchange's commitment to absorb losses rather than pass them to users may restore confidence in the platform. The scale of the hack and the involvement of a state-backed actor highlight growing risks for the global crypto market.
Read the original report — BBC News
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