Binance says it has frozen about half of $6.3 billion stolen in record hack

Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, says hackers accessed about $6.3 billion of digital assets in what is believed to be the biggest crypto theft on record, the BBC reports. It dwarfs the $1.5 billion stolen from the Bybit exchange in 2025.

What Binance says

• About $3 billion of the stolen assets has been frozen or secured.
• The exchange first suspected a single compromised engineer’s laptop, but co-CEO Richard Teng said later investigation “uncovered additional points of breach” and that the attackers used a self-destruct mechanism to erase their tools as they went.
• Binance says it has set aside more than $6.34 billion of company funds to cover the losses and told users that “your money is safe”. Deposits were not affected; withdrawals were suspended.

Who is behind it

Analytics firms Chainalysis and TRM Labs said the attack resembles earlier operations attributed to North Korean state-linked hackers (Lazarus Group / TraderTraitor). North Korea has always denied such accusations. The US Secret Service said it is working to trace and recover the funds, and Binance says it is working with the FBI.

Market impact

Bitcoin fell about 5% to around $76,800 on Friday afternoon in New York, and shares of crypto-linked firms such as Coinbase and Robinhood dropped. Lawyers quoted by the BBC warned that Binance’s promise to cover losses may not be legally binding.