Article is by Molly White, who you might recognize from Mastodon and web3isgoinggreat.com:
https://hachyderm.io/@molly0xfff/117526961419935070
I wrote up what we know about the Binance hack so far. By my best estimate, Binance is out around $3 billion after stablecoin issuers froze what they could. Changpeng Zhao is promising Binance will cover it, but he’s legally barred from running the company.
now updated to $6.8B.
So much for blockchain security and free money.
$6.8B is the figure they stole, but since some of the assets got frozen they are only left with $3B they can use
only
Did they break the security of the blockchain or just hacked an application that stored it in a database?
Isn’t blockchain just a way to control the transactions? Why can’t they just reverse the transactions and essentially deny the theft?
Well if you did that, then crypto would cease to be useful as a criminal currency, wouldn’t it?
A blockchain doesn’t actually provide control over a transaction, it just verifies that it happened. It’s supposed to be a long, immutable record of every transaction that has ever ocurred, which is precisely why transactions can’t be reversed. The work of verifying those transactions is performing by miners, or some other “proof of” design where you have an authority in the chain that confirms it.
Basically, it’s nothing more than a fancy receipt.
They were able to recover a lot, so 3B is what they cannot recover.
They had access to 6.8, Binance froze over 3 billion, and off chain partners froze other coins. They said 3 billion or less.
They had access to 6.8, Binance froze over 3 billion
So much for blockchain security and free money. You missed the point, this wasn’t supposed to be possible, bro.
“Fuck banks and the government, i will get my money on this on never pay taxes again…”
Get your shitcoin robbed*
“Help government, i got robbed”
“¯_(ツ)_/¯”
There are still people who will insist it wasn’t a stupid idea to decide meaningless digital points like the ones you get for helping Pac-Man eat dots are real-life money now.
As someone who also disbelieves in crypto, I’m not sure why real-life money shouldn’t be considered fraught.
Wow. Is this the biggest heist ever? Apart from Trump’s presidential grift and the SpaceX IPO ofc.
Most heists are digital nowadays because most people neglect cybersecurity. But since we’re talking cybersecurity, that’s the next big sector to invest if you ask me, especially with threat of AI and quantum computers.
Excellent point, now we will just have to wait a while for the AI bubble to burst completely and hopefully pick up some undervalued stocks
Just the normal crypto issues. Buy crypto, lose money.
I’m glad to no longer be in crypto. It gave me anxiety
Lotta comments here blaming the victims.
This was likely an instance of social engineering within Binance and nothing to do with the underlying securities, folks.
Are you saying Binance engineers always intended to trigger a steal? Because that’s exactly what I thought when I saw the headline but I’m not well informed about block-chain security.
No, I think someone obtained one of their employees’ credentials via social engineering. It’s not that hard to do, you just call someone and tell them you’re from IT and their password, or security key, or passkey or whatever is expiring and pretend to set them up with a new one or convince them to let you remote into their PC to make some kind of security update.
That’s usually how it happens.
Thank you for explaining!
Sure thing. Have a nice Saturday!
just imagine the Reddit bitcoiners typing “not your keys, not your crypto” 😂
Honestly, good for them.
I thought that too, until I learned it was North Korea. Probably not great that they acquired that much dark money.
Name one international this year that was worse
I’m happy to answer your question, but I don’t think I understand what you’re asking me. Can you clarify?
Lol.
Good for them.
Ah, so crypto is mainly used to prop up regimes. Got it.
Nicely done.
