Binance Hacker Still Holds $3.23 Billion, Evaded Freezes by Swapping Coins
Summary
- The Binance attacker still holds $3.23 billion in unfrozen assets.
- After freezes by Tether, Circle and other issuers, the attacker swapped stablecoins into Ether and other assets, accepting discounts of as much as 26%.
- The attacker deposited $60 million in USDT as collateral on Aave, but depositors' funds are not at risk, and Binance said it will provide full compensation for user losses.
Forecast Trend Report by Period
Unfrozen assets estimated at about $3.2 billion
Sold USDT and borrowed Ether through DeFi
The attacker who stole about $6.3 billion in cryptocurrency from Binance is still estimated to hold $3.2 billion in assets.
Blockchain analytics firm Elliptic said on October 30 the attacker responded to freeze actions by stablecoin issuers by converting the stolen funds into Ether and other assets, then borrowing against them to move the money.
In a report, Elliptic said the attacker still controls about $3.23 billion in unfrozen assets. The holdings are spread across dozens of addresses and include Bitcoin, Ether, XRP and Tron's TRX token.
Binance has publicly disclosed about $3 billion in frozen assets so far. Tether froze USDT in the attacker's main Ethereum wallet 37 minutes after the stolen funds reached it, and Circle froze USDC in the same wallet three minutes later. Ripple and other issuers also moved to freeze assets.
The attacker then focused on disposing of tokens that issuers could freeze. Elliptic said some of the stablecoins were exchanged for Ether, with the attacker accepting prices 12% to 26% below market value.
A wallet linked to the attacker also deposited $60 million of USDT into Aave. It borrowed 19,762 Wrapped Ether, or about $44.6 million, against that collateral.
LlamaRisk, a risk management firm for Aave, said the collateral is worth about $59.9 million and the debt stands at about $43.8 million. Because the collateral exceeds the loan amount, depositors' funds on Aave are not at risk, it said. The firm added that the incident did not result from a security issue in Aave's smart contracts.
Separately, Binance said it is working with law enforcement agencies and analytics firms to recover the funds and will fully compensate users for any losses. The exchange said it plans to use its Secure Asset Fund for Users, or SAFU, along with corporate funds to address the incident, and then update and disclose its proof of reserves.
Doohyun Hwang
cow5361@bloomingbit.ioKEEP CALM AND HODL🍀