Binance Reports $6.3 Billion Security Breach as Bitcoin Falls Below $77,000

Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, has reported a security breach with an estimated financial impact of approximately $6.3 billion, in what could become the largest cryptocurrency theft on record. The incident triggered a sell-off across digital asset markets, with Bitcoin falling to a six-week low of about $76,470, while Ether and other major cryptocurrencies also recorded losses.

In an October 30 security update, Binance said its preliminary investigation pointed to a potentially compromised laptop belonging to a DevOps engineer, which may have allowed an attacker to access an internal service container and submit unauthorised withdrawal transactions.

The exchange said it had found no evidence that wallet private keys were leaked and maintained that customer funds were safe, pledging to cover all losses through its Secure Asset Fund for Users (SAFU) and company reserves.

Binance said it had worked with blockchain partners to freeze approximately $3 billion in affected assets, while temporarily suspending withdrawals to conduct security checks, revoke the affected address authorisation, and support efforts to recover the funds. The exchange also engaged law enforcement agencies and blockchain intelligence firms to trace the stolen assets, with its investigation still ongoing.

The incident prompted an industry-wide response, with Tether freezing more than $1.56 billion in USDT linked to the suspected attacker, while Circle also froze affected USDC holdings; other blockchain organisations took steps to restrict the movement or use of associated assets. Binance later clarified that deposits remained operational, while withdrawals were still suspended pending security improvements, and said it expected to restore the service after completing the necessary checks.

The scale of the incident exceeds the approximately $1.5 billion Bybit hack in February 2025, previously one of the largest cryptocurrency thefts recorded. Blockchain intelligence firms TRM Labs and Chainalysis have linked the attack to North Korea’s TraderTraitor hacking group, although attribution remains subject to further investigation and Binance has not officially confirmed the perpetrators.

The exchange has promised to publish an updated Proof of Reserves after remediation and a detailed technical post-mortem once its investigation is complete.

Binance US separately said its platform was unaffected by the breach, while the incident has renewed concerns about the security of centralised exchanges and the safeguards required to protect large pools of digital assets.