Binance Freezes $3 Billion After Suspected Hack Hits $6.3 Billion
Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, is investigating what its own founder described as a hack, after estimating that the incident touched about $6.3 billion in assets. The company suspended deposits and withdrawals while its teams work through the damage, and says roughly $3 billion has already been frozen on chain with the help of blockchain partners.
The exchange has not confirmed that customer money was actually stolen, and the full extent of any losses remains unclear. A Binance spokesperson said user funds are completely safe and that security teams are reviewing all relevant information with urgency. The company said it will publish technical details once the investigation is complete and the facts are fully verified.
But the size of the figure alone makes this one of the most significant security incidents the industry has recorded. Binance said in a post on X that the estimated total impact sat at around $6.3 billion, a number that dwarfs most exchange breaches of the past decade.
Its initial findings point at an ordinary piece of corporate equipment rather than a flaw in the blockchain itself. Binance said its investigation suggests the incident may involve a compromised laptop belonging to a DevOps engineer, which allowed an attacker to reach a service container and submit unauthorised withdrawal transactions. The company added that it has found no evidence of any wallet private key leak, which is the failure that would have put every user balance at risk.
Stablecoin issuers moved quickly to lock down funds. Jeremy Allaire, cofounder and chief executive of Circle, wrote on X that his company froze the equivalent of more than $800 million associated with the incident in coordination with law enforcement. Tether chief executive Paolo Ardoino said his company froze the equivalent of more than $1.5 billion tied to what he called a potential Binance exchange hack.
And the market reacted. The price of bitcoin fell 3.2 per cent to under $79,000 as the news spread, a reminder that the largest exchange is still a single point of failure for confidence in crypto markets.
The company's founder added his own reading of events. Changpeng Zhao, who founded Binance in 2017 and no longer runs it, posted that user funds are safe but that the incident does look like a hack on Binance. He said that as a shareholder he expects all user funds will be fully covered.
Zhao's presence in the story is awkward for the company. He pleaded guilty in 2023 to a felony related to failing to prevent money laundering on the platform and stepped down as chief executive, and he was later sentenced for violating the Bank Secrecy Act, the first person ever jailed for that offence. President Donald Trump pardoned him in 2025, and Zhao and Binance have been significant backers of the Trump family's crypto ventures.
But for customers, the immediate question is access. Binance has not said when deposits and withdrawals will reopen, and its statement gave no timeline beyond promising updates through official channels once information is verified.
The wider question is whether the freeze holds. Roughly half of the estimated impact has been secured so far, which leaves a large balance dependent on how quickly exchanges, issuers and investigators can trace it.
Binance estimates the incident affected about $6.3 billion in assets
Roughly $3 billion has been frozen on chain, the company says
Binance says a compromised engineer laptop may be behind the unauthorised withdrawals
Circle froze more than $800 million and Tether more than $1.5 billion
Bitcoin fell 3.2 per cent to under $79,000 as the incident became public
Source: AP
