The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has blamed North Korean hackers for a cryptocurrency theft involving $6.3 billion from Binance, describing it as the biggest crypto heist in history.
In a statement on Saturday, the bureau linked the attack to a hacking entity known as TraderTraitor, which it said was also responsible for the $1.5 billion cyberattack on cryptocurrency exchange Bybit last year.
The FBI urged cryptocurrency exchanges, blockchain analytics firms and other industry players to block transactions associated with identified digital wallet addresses to prevent the stolen funds from being laundered.
According to the bureau, its investigation showed that TraderTraitor was converting the stolen assets mainly into Ethereum, with concerns that the hackers could use decentralised finance platforms and instant swap services to move the funds.
However, US President Donald Trump said investigators had not yet established North Korea’s involvement when asked about the incident during a Halloween event at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida on Saturday.
“We’re learning about it. We don’t know if it’s North Korea,” Trump said, adding that the investigation could eventually establish whether the country was responsible.
Ari Redbord, a cryptocurrency expert and chief policy officer at blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs, said the hackers could attempt to divide the stolen assets into smaller amounts and move them through smaller exchanges to avoid detection.
He described the incident as “bank robbery, in this case, at the speed of the Internet”, noting that blockchain tracking tools could help investigators trace the funds and potentially recover them.
The theft occurred on Thursday, when $6.3 billion worth of Bitcoin and other digital currencies was reportedly stolen from Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.
Binance said on Saturday that it had sufficient reserves in the same digital currency involved in the incident to cover 90 per cent of the missing assets.
The exchange also assured customers that they would receive full reimbursement.
