Crypto gambling platform Stake loses $41 mn in hacking

SAN FRANCISCO: Hackers have withdrawn nearly $41 million from cryptocurrency gambling site Stake likely via a stolen private key.

Stake confirmed the hacking on X (formerly Twitter), saying that unauthorised transactions were made from Stake’s Ethereum (ETH)/Binance Smart Chain (BSC) hot wallets.

“We are investigating and will get the wallets up as soon as they’re completely re-secured. User funds are safe,” the company informed.

Stake said that other crypto wallets like BTC (Bitcoin), LTC, XRP, EOS, TRX + remain fully operational.

After draining the funds, the alleged attacker distributed them to multiple accounts.

The company's Co-founder Ed Craven said that "Stake keeps a small portion of its crypto reserves in hot wallets at any given moment for these very reasons," implying that the losses are a small percentage of the total and will not affect users, reports Cointelegraph.

The stolen funds have been converted to ether (ETH) and transferred to several externally owned wallets.

Smart contract auditor Beosin reported that the attack also occurred on other blockchains, including BNB Smart Chain (BSC) and Polygon.

According to Beosin, an additional $7.8 million was lost on Polygon and $17.8 million on BSC, bringing the total losses to more than $41 million, the report mentioned.

Last year, more than $3.7 billion worth of crypto was lost to various hacks and exploits.

Stake is a crypto gambling platform that offers dice games, Blackjack, Lingo and other casino games, as well as sports betting.