Hacker Steals $4.5 Million From Bitrue Cryptocurrency Exchange

UPDATE – June 27, 11:34 P.M.: This story has been updated to reflect the changes that Bitrue has rendered, notably compensating all users who lost their funds due to the hacker’s actions.

Singapore-based cryptocurrency exchange Bitrue has been hacked, losing over $4.5 million in user assets. In other words, Bitrue has lost 9.3 million Ripple (XRP) and 2.5 million Cardano (ADA) from its hot wallet.

The platform announced the security breach on Twitter, stating that the event was identified approximately 1 A.M. local time Thursday.

At the time of the incident, Bitrue administrators detected the hack and immediately shut down trading on their platform, placing the site in maintenance mode while the staff investigated what was occurring.

According to Bitrue, the malicious hacker exploited a vulnerability in the company’s risk control team’s 2nd review process to gain access to the personal funds of approximately 90 Bitrue customers.

The hacker transferred the stolen 9.3 million XRP and 2.5 million ADA coins from Bitrue’s hot wallet to other exchanges. Bitrue notified the receiving exchanges of the arriving ill-gotten funds — particularly Bittrex, ChangeNOW, and Huobi — which it credits with assisting in freezing the applicable transactions and accounts.

Thanks again @ChangeNOW_io for the prompt response and action. It has definitely helped building confidence for the industry as a whole when communication and collaboration happen among platforms. ??? https://t.co/w1nYIWNEF7

— Bitrue (@BitrueOfficial) June 27, 2019

Bitrue assures its exchange customers that their funds are insured and that users that were affected by the breach will have their assets replaced.

The platform states that they are currently reviewing its security measures and policies to prevent such security events from occurring again in the future.

The company has contacted the Singaporean authorities to seek assistance in identifying and apprehending the cybercriminal.

Bitrue has provided the public with a link to track the flow of funds on the XRP block explorer.

Bitrue has finished conducting an emergency inspection of the platform and has already returned to live service functionality. The platform’s website is currently up, indicating that log in and trading services are working again.

UPDATE: We're happy to announce that log in & trading services are live again on Bitrue.
Additionally, any user accounts that were affected by the breach have had their assets replaced, as per the Bitrue insurance policy.
Thank you so much to everyone who has supported us ???

— Bitrue (@BitrueOfficial) June 27, 2019

The hack that occurred today is the crypto exchange’s second security incident this year. Early this year, Bitrue administrators also acknowledged that it was affected by a 51% attack on the Ethereum Classic (ETC) cryptocurrency in which a hacker had attempted to withdraw over 13,000 ETC coins worth over $100,000 from the platform’s accounts. Nevertheless, such attempted theft was unsuccessful and had been halted by its system.

?‼️Ethereum Classic (ETC) 51% Attack Detected On @BitrueOfficial

We've experienced an ETC 51% attack yesterday morning. The attacker tried to withdraw 13,000 ETC from our platform but got halted by our system. As demonstrated below: pic.twitter.com/V7YWzkldIv

— Bitrue (@BitrueOfficial) January 8, 2019

The fact that Bitrue’s security was compromised renders it as another cryptocurrency exchange hacked in 2019.

Back in May, hackers successfully stole over $40 million worth of Bitcoin from Binance. Similar to Bitrue, Binance assured its users that they would receive their funds back.

Just this week, six cybercriminals from the United Kingdom and the Netherlands were arrested in connection to the theft of $27 million (€24 million) worth of Bitcoin (BTC) cryptocurrency.

24 Hour Update

Approaching 24 hours after the official announcement of the hack, cryptocurrency exchange Bitrue has not merely re-opened, but also have compensated every user that lost funds due to the hacker’s illicit activities.

After yesterday's breach, we got back online within 24 hrs and compensated all stolen assets. FYI in case you want to update your stories @coindesk @ZDNet @mashable @cointelegraph @thenextweb @CryptoGlobeInfo

— Bitrue (@BitrueOfficial) June 28, 2019