Hackers just stole $6 billion in crypto. It’s not the first time, and it won’t be the last

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For years, the crypto industry has tried to shed its affiliation with crime while marketing itself as a safe alternative to traditional banking and investing. But once again, a record-shattering heist is deepening concerns about crypto’s vulnerabilities.

On Thursday, the world’s biggest crypto exchange, Binance, saw more than $6 billion siphoned from its system in the span of about 20 minutes. About half of those funds were linked to a kind of cryptocurrency known as stablecoins, which were quickly frozen by the firms that issue them. The other funds were tied up in digital tokens such as bitcoin and ether, which don’t have centralized governing authorities and are likely impossible to recover, according to crypto researchers.

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Binance’s losses could top $3 billion, according to researchers. The company pledged to cover the losses with emergency reserves and other assets. Binance emphasized that “user funds are safe” and said it expects to resume withdrawals by Sunday morning.

Binance suspended deposits and withdrawals Thursday, just hours after a smaller security breach throttled operations at Polymarket, the crypto-powered prediction market. This was the second apparent hack of Polymarket since June and was likely unrelated to the Binance incident.

Some 700 Polymarket users lost $2.7 million in unauthorized withdrawals, according to analytics firm Bubblemaps . Like Binance, Polymarket promised to make customers whole.

But security experts warn that covering customer losses isn’t much of a long-term strategy.

“The fact that Binance may have the balance sheet to absorb the damage is encouraging, but I wouldn’t confuse financial strength with operational security,” Ryan Kirkley, CEO of crypto infrastructure firm Global Settlement Network, said in an email.

“We’re talking about the world’s largest crypto exchange relying on emergency freezes and reimbursement promises,” he said. “That’s a serious problem for an industry asking institutions to trust it with substantially more capital.”

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To be sure, any business can be vulnerable to a cyberattack. But centralized exchanges like Binance have become high-value targets for hackers, in part because they exist outside the strict regulations that banks and other financial institutions must adhere to. And crypto has long been favored by criminal enterprises because it can move funds quickly and anonymously across borders.

Binance, which was founded in China but lacks a fixed headquarters, pleaded guilty in 2023 to violating US federal anti-money-laundering rules, among other charges — a case that landed its founder, Changpeng Zhao, in prison for four months. Zhao was pardoned by President Donald Trump last year but remains legally prohibited from running Binance.

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In Thursday’s Binance hack, researchers at Chainalysis said they observed “laundering patterns we have not seen before” and that “thousands of transactions in a short period suggest that the attackers are using automation to obscure the trail of funds .”

And despite a warm embrace from the Trump administration, crypto remains a risky business with few regulations on the books. In the United States, the vast majority of people investing in crypto do so through centralized exchanges that lack the kind of federal deposit insurance provided by traditional banks.

“Centralized exchanges pose a risk because they’re centralized… once that system gets hacked, everybody’s funds can be compromised,” said Iman Shafiei, founder of Keystone Research Group, in an email.

The simplest protection, he said, is to not leave funds sitting on the same exchanges where you buy and sell. “The moment you want to hold, move your crypto to a self-custody wallet.”

Of course, self-custody, in which a person manages their own digital wallet, comes with its own potential headaches. If an account holder loses their password, there is no customer service hotline to call and those funds are effectively gone. In 2021, Chainalysis estimated that around 20% of all the bitcoin ever created may be lost or stranded in wallets that account holders can no longer access.

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多年来，加密货币行业一直试图摆脱与犯罪的关联，同时将自身宣传为传统银行和投资之外的安全选择。然而，一起破纪录的盗窃案再次加剧了人们对加密货币脆弱性的担忧。

周四，全球最大的加密货币交易所币安在短短20分钟内损失了超过60亿美元。其中约一半资金与一种名为稳定币的加密货币相关，这些稳定币已被发行方迅速冻结。其余资金则被锁定在比特币和以太坊等数字代币中，这些代币没有中心化的管理机构，加密货币研究人员表示，这些资金几乎不可能追回。

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全球最大的加密货币交易所疑似遭朝鲜黑客攻击，这是全球最大的加密货币盗窃案。

研究人员表示，币安的损失可能超过30亿美元。该公司承诺将动用紧急储备金和其他资产来弥补损失。币安强调“用户资金安全”，并表示预计将于周日早上恢复提现。

币安周四暂停了充值和提现服务，就在几个小时前，加密货币预测市场 Polymarket 遭遇了一次规模较小的安全漏洞，导致其运营中断。这是 Polymarket 自 6 月以来第二次疑似遭到黑客攻击，可能与币安的事件无关。

据分析公司Bubblemaps称，约有700名Polymarket用户因未经授权的提现损失了270万美元。与币安一样，Polymarket承诺会全额赔偿客户的损失。

但安全专家警告说，弥补客户损失并不是长久之计。

“币安或许有足够的资产负债表来吸收损失，这令人鼓舞，但我不会将财务实力与运营安全混为一谈，”加密基础设施公司全球结算网络 (Global Settlement Network) 的首席执行官 Ryan Kirkley 在一封电子邮件中表示。

他说：“我们谈论的是全球最大的加密货币交易所，它竟然依靠紧急冻结和赔偿承诺来维持运营。对于一个要求机构投资者投入更多资金的行业来说，这是一个严重的问题。”

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诚然，任何企业都可能遭受网络攻击。但像币安这样的中心化交易所已成为黑客的高价值目标，部分原因是它们不受银行和其他金融机构必须遵守的严格监管。此外，加密货币长期以来也受到犯罪团伙的青睐，因为它能够快速、匿名地跨境转移资金。

币安是一家在中国创立但没有固定总部的加密货币公司。2023年，币安承认违反了美国联邦反洗钱法规以及其他一些罪名，其创始人赵长鹏因此被判入狱四个月。赵​​长鹏去年被美国总统唐纳德·特朗普赦免，但仍被法律禁止运营币安。

人工智能正在加速互联网安全风险的加剧。

在周四的币安黑客事件中，Chainalysis 的研究人员表示，他们观察到了“以前从未见过的洗钱模式”，并且“短时间内发生的数千笔交易表明，攻击者正在使用自动化手段来掩盖资金流向”。

尽管特朗普政府对加密货币持积极态度，但它仍然是一项高风险业务，相关监管措施寥寥无几。在美国，绝大多数加密货币投资者都是通过中心化交易所进行投资，而这些交易所缺乏传统银行提供的联邦存款保险。

“中心化交易所存在风险，因为它们是中心化的……一旦该系统被黑客攻击，每个人的资金都可能受到损害，” Keystone Research Group 的创始人 Iman Shafiei 在一封电子邮件中表示。

他表示，最简单的保护措施就是不要把资金留在你买卖加密货币的交易所。“一旦你想持有加密货币，就把它转移到你自己的托管钱包里。”

当然，自行保管（即个人管理自己的数字钱包）也存在一些潜在问题。如果账户持有人丢失密码，则无法拨打客服热线，资金实际上就丢失了。Chainalysis 在 2021 年估计，迄今为止创建的所有比特币中，约有 20% 可能已经丢失或滞留在账户持有人无法访问的钱包中。