Cybercriminals successfully hacked into the popular crypto exchange Poloniex—owned by Justin Sun. They stole about $126 million worth of cryptocurrency. Hackers managed to target one of Poloniex’s hot wallets, which are accessible with less delay for withdrawal of funds. This event goes on to show that despite the growing security capabilities of cryptocurrency exchanges, they still have a lot of work due to persisting digital asset safety issues.
The Hack and Stolen Assets
Initially, at the alert stage, Peckshield raised a red flag on the suspicious outflow based on the Etherscan data, indicating four different withdrawals to three separate external wallets linked to the hacker’s identity. These were assets such as ETH, TRX, USDT, TUSD, among others, including the popular meme coins like PEPE, FLOKI, and SHIB.
Hi @Poloniex, you may want to take a look: @justinsuntron https://t.co/UobItZ9FpO
— PeckShield Inc. (@peckshield) November 10, 2023
The other information released by Arkham Intelligence related to close monitoring revealed that more than 288 million TRX as well as 865 bitcoins valued at about $126 million were stolen. There was an observed spike of about 20 percent of TMX as a result of the attacker making an offer worth 20 million dollars to purchase the TMX. Surprisingly, following the hack, TRX’s worth increased from $0.09 to $0.11.
Justin Sun’s Reaction
Afterward, Justin assured the public that Poloniex was on high alert and carried out a thorough investigation into the leakage. Sun, the owner of Poloniex since 2019, has also claimed that the exchange remains financially stable and will compensate all its victims.
Strangely, Sun came with a white hat bounty of 5%, which are hackers that locate flaws with the intention of improving security. The purpose of this inducement is to encourage the thieves to return the misapplied funds. Nevertheless, Sun said that they would give the intruders some seven days to refund their money on their own before going for legal intervention.
The vulnerability of cybercriminals’ attacks on crypto exchanges is again proven, and a high-security level for digital assets is becoming increasingly important in a dynamically developing environment. Users and industry observers will keenly follow what transpires after these attempts by Poloniex to recover the funds.
