Newsletter
- Brazil's largest cryptocurrency exchange, Mercado Bitcoin, stated that the hacker attack on its system on November 2nd would not result in any losses for customers.
- There are discrepancies in the estimation of losses: exchanges claim it to be around 38 million US dollars, Hypernative states it exceeds 40 million US dollars, Arkham says it is at least 46 million US dollars, and Chainalysis estimates it to be around 49 million US dollars.
- Just a few days ago, on FBI, several sources attributed the $6 billion theft from Binance to North Korea. Since then, recharges and withdrawals on Mercado Bitcoin have remained suspended, with no set date for resumption yet.
Brazil's largest cryptocurrency exchange stated that users will not have to bear the costs of this hacker attack. Mercado Bitcoin lost tens of millions of dollars on Monday, and the company said that these losses will be borne by the platform, not by the customers.
The way exchanges keep users' tokens is just like how banks keep cash; and when such institutions suffer from theft, customers can often only wait to see how much they will be able to get back in the end.
After discovering a system intrusion in the early hours of November 2, the exchange froze all recharges and withdrawals. In a Portuguese statement posted on X, Mercado Bitcoin stated: "This morning, we identified and quickly controlled a security incident within one of our systems. As a preventive measure, recharges and withdrawals have been temporarily suspended."
The company stated that there was no loss of customer funds, nor was there any data leakage. It has not yet explained how the attackers managed to gain access to the system.
As for exactly how much assets were stolen, the figures provided by different sources do not match. Security company Hypernative has identified suspicious transfers amounting to over 40 million US dollars, involving at least 10 blockchain networks, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, and Tron.
On November 3rd, Mercado Bitcoin posted on X in Portuguese, saying: "Hello everyone. First and foremost, it is important to note that customer assets are protected, and the balances are still recorded in their respective accounts. Yesterday (November 2nd), we identified a security incident. We immediately activated our security and governance protocols and notified the relevant departments..."
The figures provided by the exchange themselves are even lower. In another Portuguese update posted on X, Mercado Bitcoin stated: "Currently, the value of the assets involved is approximately 38 million US dollars. Following rapid actions taken in collaboration with the crypto community and strategic partners, including Tether, Circle, Paxos, BRL1, and Chainalysis, we have frozen 11 million US dollars."
Other institutions have provided higher figures. Blockchain analysts from Arkham have tracked at least $46 million, while Chainalysis estimates it to be around $49 million, of which nearly $10 million has been frozen. The exchange has not clarified whether the claimed $38 million includes the frozen amount.
The CEO of Tether, the stablecoin issuer, stated on X that over $4.5 million related to this incident has been frozen. USDT is a token pegged to the US dollar.
Freezing can only prevent these tokens from being transferred further and will not return them directly to their owners. This is also why it is particularly important that exchanges commit to bearing the losses in this matter.
On October 29th, hackers stole over $6 billion in assets from Binance, the world's largest exchange. FBI attributed this to North Korea's TraderTraitor gang. Mercado Bitcoin has not yet linked this incident to that attack.
At that time, Binance also made a commitment similar to Mercado Bitcoin. Binance's CEO, Richard Teng, wrote on X: "Binance will bear the financial consequences of the stolen funds, not our users." He also added that approximately 95% of the affected assets have been replenished.
Neither of these two commitments can be independently verified from external sources. The guarantee to cover losses ultimately depends on whether there is sufficient financial support behind it, and exchanges are not obligated to make their account books public to customers.
As of now, the recharging and withdrawal functions for Mercado Bitcoin are still on hold, with no scheduled date for resumption. The exchange stated that they will release an update on X and restart services once full security has been re-established.
