This is reported by Kontrakty, citing the publication “Mizha”.
Ben Zhou, the CEO of Bybit, revealed that hackers gained access to the exchange’s offline Ethereum wallet. According to analyst ZachXBT, approximately $1.46 billion was withdrawn from the wallet during suspicious transactions.
Research firm Arkham Intelligence confirmed the outflow of funds amounting to around $1.4 billion and noted that the stolen assets have already begun to be transferred to new wallets and sold. Elliptic, a blockchain analytics company, recognized this breach as the largest in cryptocurrency history, surpassing the Poly Network hack in 2021 when $611 million was stolen.
"This is likely the largest financial incident in history, not just in the crypto industry," stated Rob Benke, co-founder and head of the cybersecurity firm Halborn.
To reassure clients, Zhou conducted a live stream on X, assuring users that their funds are safe and withdrawals remain accessible. Bybit has already secured about 80% of the necessary funds to cover the losses through loans from partners. Additionally, the exchange is working on recovering the stolen assets and plans to take legal action against the hackers.
"Your funds are safe, and withdrawals are still open," emphasized Zhou. He mentioned that the exchange has processed over 70% of withdrawal requests following the incident. Zhou also noted that Bybit is not currently purchasing Ethereum to cover the lost assets.
Founded in 2018, Bybit has become one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world, with a daily trading volume exceeding $36 billion. At the time of the hack, the exchange had approximately $16.2 billion in assets, indicating that hackers stole about 9% of the total amount.
According to Nansen, among the stolen assets were approximately $1.12 billion in Ethereum, as well as derivative tokens such as stETH. The hackers initially transferred the assets to a single wallet and then distributed them across more than 40 other wallets. Subsequently, the perpetrators converted all derivative tokens into Ethereum and transferred the assets in batches of $27 million to additional wallets.
Arkham Intelligence and ZachXBT stated that the attack was carried out by the North Korean hacker group Lazarus, known for its previous hacks of cryptocurrency exchanges, including WazirX and Radiant Capital.
"These are very experienced hackers, indicating a high level of organization," noted Shahar Madar, vice president of security at Fireblocks, which is assisting Bybit with the investigation.
Following the news of the hack, the price of Ethereum dropped nearly 8%, while Bitcoin lost about 5%. Additionally, the USDe token from Ethena Labs temporarily lost its peg to the US dollar, falling to $0.98 before stabilizing.