Bitpoint resumes service a month after closure

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Bitpoint, a Japanese Crypto exchange platform, has resumed trading barely a month after a massive hack led to the termination of all services on it’s the platform.

According to an announcement contained in the ‘Portal Service Resumption Policy,’ dated August 5 2019, deposits and withdrawal of fiat money on the exchange is scheduled to begin on August 6, at 1400hrs.

Bitpoint was closed July 11 after an internal investigations revealed an illegal outflow of virtual currency from its platform resulting from a hack. The crypto exchange reported to have lost assets amounting to $28 million. From this amount, Bitpoint reported that $23 million belonged to its customers.

The stolen crypto assets consisted of 1,225 SegWitCoin (BTC), 11,169 Ether, and 5,108 Litecoin, amongst others. However, the group behind the hack is yet to be disclosed. An investigation is currently underway to determine the same.

The discovery lead to the termination of all deposits and withdrawals services within the platform. Other terminated services included; WEB trading site, BitPoint MT4 transactions, API and Smart API services, Store settlement services, BitPoint wallet app, and BitPoint LITE application.

In an announcement addressing the hack, Remix Inc, Bitpoint’s parent company, stated that Bitpoint would compensate all the affected customers. According to the announcement, the customers affected would receive the funds back on a 1:1 ratio basis.

Notably, Bitpoint has discarded the compromised hot wallet from its platform. It has also subjected all its other wallets to a thorough and comprehensive assessment to ensure security. This, it has done to raise its customers confidence.

In further attempts to improve safety on its platform, the crypto exchange has added new security measures. These include: not accepting withdrawals that are less than the bank’s transfer fees, and directly contacting a customer if the need arises, especially when confirming applications. In addition, the exchange will not validate transactions recorded under old names of banks that have had a name change. Bitpoint’s customers will also have to wait for two-business days to have funds transferred from the platform to their bank accounts.