Crypto exchange Bybit announced early on Saturday that it will offer 10 % of recovered funds —up to$ 140 million ) to any on-chain security experts who can assist the company in recovering its assets after losing more than$ 1.4 billion worth of Ethereum and related tokens in a sophisticated hack.
” We were overjoyed with help from some of the best people and organizations in the industry within the first 24 hours of the occasion, and we do not take it for granted. We have shared in a black time of crypto story, and we’ve proven we are better than the nefarious players”, said Bybit co-founder and CEO Ben Zhou, in a statement.
” We want to actually encourage our community who lent us their expertise, experience, and support through the Recovery Bounty Program, and our efforts to make this tough training a significant one does not prevent here”, he added. ” Bybit is determined to climb above the loss and ultimately transform our safety infrastructure, improve cash, and be a staunch partner to our friends in the crypto society”.
More than$ 1.4 billion in ETH and stETH were stolen from Bybit early on Friday in what is thought to be the biggest crypto hack of all time based on the value of assets at the time of the attack.
The firm said that a transaction from its multi-signature Ethereum cold ( or storage ) wallet to its hot wallet (used for regular transactions ) had been manipulated in some fashion, masking the real destination of the hackers ‘ own wallet.
Although the investigation is still ongoing, Arkham Intelligence revealed on Friday afternoon that prominent pseudonymous on-chain sleuth ZachXBT had ties the hack to North Korea’s Lazarus group.
In an X thread over the weekend, ZachXBT provided additional proof linking wallets used in the laundering of Bybit funds to other attacks thought to be carried out by Lazarus, such as Phemex and BingX hacks.
On Friday, Paolo Ardoino—the CEO of stablecoin giant Tether—said that his firm had frozen$ 181, 000 worth of the UDST tied to stolen Bybit funds, with the help of ZachXBT.
” Might not be much but it’s honest work”, Ardoino wrote on X. ” We keep monitoring”.
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