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Today's Top Crypto Headlines:
Lazarus Behind Bybit Hack | Bybit Reserves Hold Strong | eXch Denies Laundering Ties and more...
King Fatrick Gil Añasco
February 24, 2025
Good Morning Crypto Enthusiasts!
Glad to have you back for another edition of the UseTheBitcoin.com newsletter.
Lazarus Behind Bybit Hack: ZachXBT linked North Korea’s Lazarus Group to Bybit’s $1.4B hack, earning a $31,500 bounty.
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Bybit Reserves Hold Strong: Despite a $5.3B asset drop, Bybit’s reserves still exceed liabilities. Hacken confirmed financial stability, while Binance and Bitget aided recovery.
💡Feature of the Day - eXch Denies Laundering Ties: eXch denied laundering $35M from the Bybit hack but admitted handling some funds.
All this and more in today’s headlines!
📰 News Highlights:
Blockchain investigator ZachXBT identified the North Korean Lazarus Group as responsible for the $1.4 billion Bybit hack, earning a $31,500 bounty from Arkham Intelligence.
BREAKING: BYBIT $1 BILLION HACK BOUNTY SOLVED BY ZACHXBT
At 19:09 UTC today, @zachxbt submitted definitive proof that this attack on Bybit was performed by the LAZARUS GROUP.
His submission included a detailed analysis of test transactions and connected wallets used ahead of… x.com/i/web/status/1…
— Arkham (@arkham)
8:21 PM • Feb 21, 2025
The hack, the largest in crypto exchange history, targeted staked Ether and ERC-20 tokens.
Bybit ETH multisig cold wallet just made a transfer to our warm wallet about 1 hr ago. It appears that this specific transaction was musked, all the signers saw the musked UI which showed the correct address and the URL was from @safe . However the signing message was to change… x.com/i/web/status/1…
— Ben Zhou (@benbybit)
3:44 PM • Feb 21, 2025
The crypto community reacted with support for Bybit, with industry leaders like Tron’s Justin Sun and OKX offering assistance.
We have been monitoring the Bybit incident very closely and will do our best to assist our partners in tracking the relevant funds, providing all the support within our capabilities.
— H.E. Justin Sun 🍌 (@justinsuntron)
4:39 PM • Feb 21, 2025
KuCoin emphasized the need for exchange collaboration to combat cybercrime.
[KuCoin Official Statement: Standing with Bybit & Strengthening Crypto Security]
Dear KuCoin Community,
We are deeply concerned about the recent $1.4 billion security breach at Bybit and stand in full support of Bybit, its team, and CEO Ben Zhou as they work through this… x.com/i/web/status/1…— KuCoin (@kucoincom)
4:45 PM • Feb 21, 2025
Despite concerns, Coinbase’s Conor Grogan reassured users that Bybit’s withdrawals remained functional, and the platform had over $20 billion in assets.
Bybit appears to be processing withdrawals just fine after their hack
They have $20B+ in assets on platform and their cold wallets are untouched. Given the isolated nature of the signing hack, and how well capitalized Bybit is, I don't expect there to be contagion
— Conor (@jconorgrogan)
3:58 PM • Feb 21, 2025
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Despite the $1.4 billion hack and a total asset drop of $5.3 billion, Bybit’s reserves still exceed liabilities, ensuring full backing of user funds.
🚨 @Bybit_Official Proof of Reserves Update
Today’s hack was massive—a tough hit for the industry. But here’s the bottom line: Bybit’s reserves still exceed its liabilities.
As their independent PoR auditor, we’ve confirmed that user funds remain fully backed.
🔹 What this… x.com/i/web/status/1…
— Hacken🇺🇦 | ETHDenver ✈️ (@hackenclub)
8:06 PM • Feb 21, 2025
Independent auditor Hacken confirmed that Bybit remains financially stable, processing 350,000 withdrawal requests within hours of the incident.
Since the hack (10 hrs ago) , Bybit has experienced the most number of withdraws that we have ever seen, We have had a total number of more than 350k withdraws requests, so far, around 2100 withdraw requests left to be processed. Overall 99. 994% withdraws have been completed. If… x.com/i/web/status/1…
— Ben Zhou (@benbybit)
12:54 AM • Feb 22, 2025
Emergency fund transfers from Binance, Bitget, and HTX Group helped stabilize the exchange.
The 40K #ETH transferred to Bybit earlier (about 7 hours ago) are all Bitget’s own funds.
All #Bitget users’ assets are securely stored on our platform, and we release monthly proof of reserves (PoR) to ensure a reserve ratio greater than 1:1.
#Bybit… x.com/i/web/status/1…
— Gracy Chen @Bitget (@GracyBitget)
3:17 AM • Feb 22, 2025
Experts believe the breach exploited Bybit’s Ethereum multisig cold wallet, tricking signers into approving a malicious contract.
I do agree with CZ that if this hack was conducted through penetrating our internal systems such as any part of the withdraw system or one of our hot wallet was breached, we would've halted all withdraws until we find the root cause of the problem. In the case of yesterday, it… x.com/i/web/status/1…
— Ben Zhou (@benbybit)
1:17 PM • Feb 22, 2025
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💡 Feature of the Day:
Crypto exchange eXch denied laundering money for North Korea’s Lazarus Group after onchain sleuth ZachXBT and security experts accused it of processing $35 million from the Bybit hack.
eXch admitted handling a small portion of the hacked funds but insisted it was an isolated case, with related fees set to be donated for public good.
By my estimate, eXch did about $30M of volume for DPRK today. Curious to see how long they can keep this up.
If you use eXch... don't be surprised when any service with a compliance program starts doing enhanced due diligence on your source of funds.
bitcointalk.org/index.php?topi…— Nick Bax.eth (@bax1337)
9:35 PM • Feb 22, 2025
Despite these claims, blockchain analysts, including SlowMist and the Security Alliance, allege that eXch facilitated large-scale laundering.
⚠️Given the significant amount of ETH already laundered through eXch into BTC, XMR, etc., platforms should tighten risk controls on any funds coming from there.
— MistTrack🕵️ (@MistTrack_io)
4:24 AM • Feb 23, 2025
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And that’s it for this today.
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See you all tomorrow’s edition!
Jonathan Gibson
UseTheBitcoin.com