On Friday, Japanese cryptocurrency exchange firm Bitpoint announced that they had been hacked ¥3.5 billion ($32 million) had been stolen. This included ¥2.5 billion ($23 million) from customer accounts. On July 15, Bitpoint announced that the number has increased, as an additional ¥250 Million ($2.3 million) was reported missing.
According to the company, the additional missing funds were discovered in overseas exchanges. These exchanges use the Tokyo-based Bitpoint as a trading system. The funds were taken from hot wallets and included SegWitCoin (BTC), Ripple, and other dark coins.
Since the hack was first detected, Bitpoint has suspended all accounts and services, including withdrawals, trading, and deposits. They have added that they have not found any irregular activity related to cold wallets, but have still frozen these accounts and trades and activity related to them until a thorough investigation has been completed.
This hack has had an adverse effect on the company’s reputation, which has hurt its parent firm as well. Remixpoint Inc. reported that they have lost 19% in their stock price since the theft was reported. Now the stock has gone untraded in Tokyo due to a lot of orders to sell the stock, which led to a removal of the stock from the exchange. It is hoped that this will help to protect the stock and keep it viable while the company re-examines and implements new systems.
Bitpoint was one of a few crypto exchange services that were informed by Japan‘s Financial Services Agency (FSA) that they needed to take greater steps to protect the integrity of their systems. This occurred following a hack at Coincheck that resulted in the loss of $534 million in cryptocurrency.
One additional hack has occurred since then. In September 2018, Zaif lost $60 million to an attack on their platform. The FSA not only demanded greater protection for these digital assets but also acquired the two exchanges to reimburse customers for the losses. It is expected that they will do that here as well, which will put Bitpoint on the hook for the entire amount that was lost.
Until the company figures out exactly what steps they need to take to prevent attacks in the future, accounts will remain frozen and all trading will be suspended. This is the only logical steps can be taken, but it is not known when the exchange service will be able to open its doors again.
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