Hackers steal $114 mn from crypto exchange Poloniex

SAN FRANCISCO: Hackers have stolen $114 million from cryptocurrency exchange Poloniex, after its “hot wallets” were drained by cyber-criminals.

Poloniex investor Justin Sun posted on X that the company was investigating the hack incident.

“Poloniex maintains a healthy financial position and will fully reimburse the affected funds. Additionally, we are exploring opportunities for collaboration with other exchanges to facilitate the recovery of these funds,” Sun posted.

Various wallets across multiple blockchains appear to have been targeted, reports CoinDesk. Arkham data shows that an Ethereum wallet, now tagged as "Poloniex hacker," sent a total of $114 million worth of tokens from Poloniex in 357 transactions.

A wallet on the Tron blockchain also sent around $42 million to various wallets.

Poloniex is one of the longest-running crypto exchanges. It was acquired by Circle in 2018 and later spun off to several investors, including Sun.

The crypto exchange has facilitated $616 million worth of trading volume over the past 24 hours, according to CoinMarketCap. On-chain data also showed the Poloniex hacker bought $20 million worth of tron (TRX), pushing the token's price up by more than 25 per cent.

Blockchain analytics company Nansen reported that there were just 175 tokens left in Poloniex's wallet, worth a total of $10,000.

Sun added that the crypto exchange is offering a 5 per cent white hat bounty to the hacker with a deadline of seven days before engaging with law enforcement.

The company "successfully identified and froze a portion of the assets associated with the hacker's addresses. At present, the losses are within manageable limits, and Poloniex's operating revenue can cover these losses," Sun posted.