Japanese crypto exchange Bitpoint became the latest victim of a hack that lost ¥3.5 billion JPY (or roughly $32 million USD. Out of all the money lost over $23 million belonged to the customers.
Now, it has been reported that over 250 million yen ($2.3 million) has been recovered by the exchange.
The hackers stole a variety of crypto assets, including XRP and bitcoin, from the firm's hot wallets. They stole from five different cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, and Ripple. They have said that all the cryptos stolen were from its hot wallet, with its cold wallet untouched.
Remixpoint, who runs the exchange, shares plunged 19 percent to their daily lower limit and were untraded in Tokyo as of 1:44 p.m. on a glut of sell orders. The exchange said it detected the hack because of errors related to the remittance of Ripple funds to customers. Twenty-seven minutes after detecting the errors, Bitpoint admins realized they had been hacked, and three hours later, they discovered thefts from other cryptocurrency assets.
There has been a rise in crypto exchanges getting hacked again. Last year, Coincheck revealed that it’s lost nearly $400 million in a security breach. It was roughly the same scale as the 2014 Mt Gox theft, in which thieves made off with $400 million in bitcoin, causing the Japanese coin exchange to file for bankruptcy.
In June 2018, Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) issued business improvement orders to multiple domestic crypto exchanges, Bitpoint being one of them. One of FSA’ main concerns is the exchanges’ compliance with anti-money-laundering (AML) requirements. The regulator has also raised concerns about cases where it claims that customers’ assets are not being adequately separated from those of the exchange.
