After the unprecedented cyber attack that left Bybit reeling, a significant portion of the stolen digital assets remains traceable. The colossal hack, which occurred on Feb. 21, saw Bybit lose over $1.4 billion of stETH, mETH, and other cryptocurrencies, marking the largest heist in crypto history.
The primary suspects, North Korea’s Lazarus Group, have been trying to render the stolen funds untraceable. However, despite their attempts, over 88% of the stolen $1.4 billion remains traceable, according to Ben Zhou, Bybit exchange’s co-founder and CEO.
Zhou revealed in a post on March 20: “Of the total hacked funds which amount to 1.4 billion USD or around 500k ETH, 88.87% remain traceable, 7.59% have gone dark, 3.54% have been frozen.”
He further detailed that the majority of the funds were laundered through Bitcoin mixers and converted into Bitcoin across thousands of wallets.
A month after the hack, hope persists that a portion of these funds can be frozen and recovered by Bybit. The exchange has paid over $2.2 million to “bounty hunters” – ethical hackers and investigators who can provide relevant information leading to the freezing of the funds.
The Bybit incident underlines the vulnerability of even secure exchanges to sophisticated cyberattacks. “This incident is another stark reminder that even the strongest security measures can be undone by human error,” cautions Lucien Bourdon, an analyst at Trezor.
Surpassing the $600 million Poly Network hack in August 2021, the Bybit heist is now the largest crypto exchange breach to date.
