Bybit CEO Ben Zhou said in a livestream that the exchange’s Ethereum wallet incident involved a compromise of its ETH cold-wallet signing process during a routine transfer to a warm wallet, resulting in the theft of roughly 401,000 ETH, valued at about $1.4 billion to $1.5 billion at the time. Zhou said the issue appeared limited to the Ethereum wallet infrastructure and that other wallets, including Bitcoin reserves, were not affected. Bybit said customer funds remained safe, withdrawals stayed open, and the company had sufficient treasury resources and external financing to cover the loss if the stolen assets were not recovered. The incident mattered because it was described as one of the largest exchange hacks in crypto history, triggering a major withdrawal surge and renewed scrutiny of wallet-signing security, multisig safeguards, and the operational risks of cold-to-warm wallet transfers.

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