Binance security breach results in a loss of $41 million, or 7000 BTC

Binance, one of the biggest crypto exchanges, reported a security breach on Tuesday that resulted in the theft of $40.6 million, or 7000 BTC. 

According to the company's blog post, the hackers were able to obtain a large number of users API keys, 2FA codes, and potentially other information. With this information, the hackers withdrew 7000 BTC in one transaction. Although this is the only identified transaction so far, the company warns that additional accounts may be affected as well. 

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Binance says that it will cover the incident in full so no user funds will be affected. However, the company is currently suspending all deposits and withdrawals during its security review. 

"The hackers had the patience to wait, and execute well-orchestrated actions through multiple seemingly independent accounts at the most opportune time," Binance states in its blog post. "It was unfortunate that we were not able to block this withdrawal before it was executed."

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Celia joined The Block as a reporter after earning her BA in the History of Science from the University of Chicago. Having spent years pondering over why 2+2 cannot equal 5, she is interested in the history and philosophy of mathematics, computation, and cryptography. She also had a very brief stint at Crunchbase News.