Binance reports 90% of $6.3B hack losses replenished with 10 major assets fully backed; withdrawal resumption scheduled for Nov 1.
Security & Exploits ·
Attackers linked to North Korea stole approximately $6.4 billion from Binance on Thursday, marking the largest cryptocurrency exchange hack on record—more than four times the previous high. The theft, attributed to the group TraderTraitor by blockchain analytics firms, unfolded over roughly 20 minutes as funds were drained from hot wallets across about 10 blockchains. The attack targeted Binance's internal infrastructure rather than the blockchains themselves; an initial investigation pointed to a compromised DevOps engineer's laptop, though CEO Richard Teng later described discovering "additional points of breach" and "a more complex attack process" that involved multiple unauthorized access paths.
On Ethereum, the attacker exploited EIP-7702, a 2025 feature permitting ordinary wallets to run smart-contract code temporarily, using 50 pre-signed authorizations to convert a Binance hot wallet into a sweeper contract. Critically, Binance found no evidence of leaked private keys and stated that wallet private keys remained secure throughout the breach. The same North Korean group was previously attributed to the February 2025 Bybit heist valued at $1.5 billion.
Binance committed to covering all losses via company funds and its Secure Asset Fund for Users, having set aside more than $6.34 billion—with roughly $5 billion already held in the stolen asset types. The exchange paused withdrawals to rebuild systems and conduct security reviews, with withdrawal resumption targeted for November 1 and a full proof of reserves to follow. How much of the stolen cryptocurrency remains in the attacker's control or has been converted remains unclear.