Malicious actors drain yet another crypto-related firm.
Cryptocurrency exchange CoinEx has found itself in a precarious position after witnessing unusual withdrawal activities amounting to $27 million on September 12th. This led security analysts to believe the crypto exchange fell victim to a cyber attack.
On the afternoon of September 12th at 1:21 PM UTC, CoinEx's hot wallet initiated a transfer of nearly 4,947 Ether (ETH) to an Ethereum account that had never been used. At the prevailing market rate, the value of this transfer was approximately $7.9 million.
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What followed was an outpouring of different tokens from the same hot wallet to the same mysterious Ethereum account. Among the assets transferred were 408,741 Dai (DAI) stablecoins, 2.7 million Graph (GRT) tokens, 29,158 Uniswap (UNI) tokens, and a variety of other cryptocurrencies.
Blockchain security service PeckShield was one of the first to raise a red flag, categorizing the transfers as "suspicious" in nature. Julio Moreno, CryptoQuant's head of research, supported this assessment, calling the activity "strange" and noting that the Ethereum reserves in CoinEx's hot wallet had been reduced to zero.
By 5:25 PM UTC, CoinEx took to X (formerly Twitter) to confirm the questionable withdrawal activities. The crypto exchange stated:
<O>ur Risk Control System detected anomalous withdrawals from several hot wallet addresses used to store CoinEx's exchange assets.
A specialized team has since been formed to investigate the situation and ascertain what transpired. However, CoinEx reassured its users that the affected assets represent only a fraction of the crypto exchange's overall reserves. Furthermore, they promised that users would "receive 100% compensation for any loss due to this breach."
The latest development leaves CoinEx, as well as the cryptocurrency community at large, on high alert. Investigations are currently underway to get to the root of this unsettling incident. Until then, traders and investors are advised to exercise caution and stay tuned for updates on this significant security lapse.
