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Bithumb, one of the largest exchanges in Asia, just broke the news that it has been hacked, with the hackers reportedly stealing over $30 million worth of cryptocurrencies.
Bithumb Wallet Change Backfires
At 12:49 UTC on June 19th, Bithumb announced that they would be temporarily suspending deposits due to a change in wallets with their exchange service. Although a change in the wallet system may be a security improvement for some exchanges, it ended up backfiring, resulting in an unexpected cryptocurrency hack.
Just 12 minutes after they suspended their deposit system, they announced that they were going to suspend all deposit and withdrawal services due to an over $30 million hack from wallets. Bithumb said:
https://twitter.com/BithumbOfficial/status/1009239883645243392
It is great to see that Bithumb had their hands on the trigger in case anything went wrong, quickly moving all assets to cold storage to mitigate any further risk.
It is likely that one of the wallets they exchanged to contain malicious code, resulting in hackers stealing over $30 million dollars of cryptocurrencies, which still remain unnamed at the time of writing. To further mitigate risk, Bithumb has announced that all deposits and withdrawals will be stopped until further notice, allowing Bithumb to get its security systems back under control.
As aforementioned, Bithumb is one of the largest exchanges in Asia, collectively trading over $270 million dollars worth of cryptocurrencies in the past 24 hours. $30 million in hacked cryptocurrencies may seem like a vast sum, however, while putting into the context of the whole cryptocurrency market, it is unjust to say that this hack should have caused the market to drop over by over three percent.
Charlie Lee, founder of Litecoin, made an announcement on Twitter advising users that users should keep their cryptocurrencies in secure personal wallets.
Another day, another hack. Hopefully BitThumb is able to cover this amount, though $30MM is not a small amount.
As I've said many times, be smart and only keep on exchange coins that you are actively trading. It's best to withdraw right after trading. https://t.co/8YpVcHx8tK
— Charlie Lee Ⓜ️🕸️ (@SatoshiLite) June 20, 2018
As this is breaking news, it is currently unclear how Bithumb and its customers are going to address the problem as this situation develops. But as Charlie Lee said, “Hopefully Bithumb is able to cover this amount, though $30 million is no small amount.”
When this announcement broke at 1 AM UTC on June the 20th, the cryptocurrency market took an immediate hit, with Bitcoin falling over $200 dollars within the span of a few minutes. It has since stop dropping, finding price levels at $6600.
Terzo 
HairyHerry 
KampungHighlander 
JohnR 
Either these clowns are completely incompetent or what I think really has happened is the coins and money have been stollen or temporarily confiscated by the exchange themselves. Without regulations and independent audits it is way too easy for exchanges to claim “hack” and get away with it. Even if they do cover most of their users assets the real question will be how quick this is down. If it takes a long time or never happens at all I’m 100% certain this hack was a fake.
Everything is recorded on the blockchain. Wherever these coins went if they were actually hacked can be traced. This is the whole point of having a blockchain ledger.
This is why if you are going to trade BTC or any coin do it via leverage. I know leverage is risky but it is the only way to protect your capital without having too much of it sitting on an exchange whilst you trade. Otherwise just buy the dips and keep it on a hardware wallet until you need to cash in.
Regulation and independent audit can’t come soon enough. Unless this happens big institutional money will not invest in crypto no matter what the BS bullish news is saying. No one is going to risk hundreds of millions of dollars if hacks can be claimed so easily without any recourse or independent audit. Those in the know are convinced the Mt.Gox hack of 2014 was BS and the exchange took off with peoples assets.
The last paragraph I strongly disagree with! WHY would any business entrust an exchange with such a valuable asset, especially in light of these hacks, regardless if an inside or outside job?? Haven’t they heard of Cold Wallet Storage, exactly the solution which Bithumb is using to secure the assets not stolen.
Big institutional money will eventually invest but it won’t be through the existing exchanges.
More incompetent idiots. So great for the industry!