Binance $6.3 Billion Hack: What Happened and What Crypto Holders Should Know
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Not financial advice: This article is for information only. It is not investment, legal or tax advice. Crypto is volatile and you can lose money. Do your own research and talk to a licensed professional before making decisions.
Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange, says a security breach affected an estimated $6.3 billion in crypto assets, which analysts say may be the biggest crypto theft ever. Bitcoin dropped to a six-week low and about $1.57 billion in leveraged bets were wiped out. Here’s what we know so far, with sources.
At a glance
- Size: about $6.3 billion affected, per Binance (Reuters).
- Frozen so far: about $3 billion, per Binance.
- Withdrawals: paused. Binance co-founder Yi He said withdrawals are expected to start resuming within about 48 hours (CNBC). Reports conflict on deposits: CNBC and the BBC say deposits were unaffected, while BleepingComputer reported both deposits and withdrawals suspended (CoinDesk).
- Possible cause: Binance says its early investigation suggests a compromised DevOps engineer’s laptop (CNBC).
- Who: TRM Labs and Elliptic linked the attack to North Korea-linked hackers (CoinDesk). Chainalysis said it had “a high degree of confidence” in TRM’s attribution to TraderTraitor, the North Korean group also tracked as Lazarus (BleepingComputer). Binance said its investigation “has not attributed responsibility to any individual.”
- Customers: Binance has pledged to cover all losses.
What happened
Binance said on Thursday, Oct 29, that a security incident had an estimated $6.3 billion impact. Its initial investigation suggests “a compromised DevOps engineer’s laptop, which allowed an attacker to gain access to a service container and submit unauthorized withdrawal transactions,” according to CNBC. Chainalysis’ head of research told Reuters it had confirmed at least $5.912 billion stolen as of 8:30 p.m. ET, with funds moving across Bitcoin, Ethereum, Tron, Ripple and several Layer 2 networks. Binance later said the attack was more complex: co-CEO Richard Teng said “our subsequent investigation has uncovered additional points of breach” and that it “was not carried out by one person” (BBC). If the figure holds, it’s far larger than the previous record, the roughly $1.5 billion Bybit hack in 2025.
How the market reacted
- Bitcoin fell about 3-4% and briefly dropped to around $76,400, its lowest since Sept. 18 (CoinDesk).
- Ether briefly hit about $2,170, and Binance’s BNB token fell about 6% (CoinDesk, CNBC).
- Crypto futures liquidations jumped to about $1.57 billion, mostly long positions (CoinDesk).
- Coinbase and Strategy shares fell too, alongside a wider tech selloff led by Intel (CoinDesk live updates).
- Standard Chartered said prices could stay under pressure until more details come out and frozen assets are released (CoinDesk).
Separately, CoinDesk reports Polymarket suspended international trading after hackers drained more than $2.6 million from user accounts.
For more on tech and money, see our take on whether AI stocks are a smart investment or hype and how Cisco used AI to rewrite most of its code.
What you can do now
- Get updates only from Binance’s official channels. Big hacks bring a wave of fake “refund” and “recovery” scams. Never share seed phrases or 2FA codes, and don’t click links in unsolicited messages.
- Turn on strong 2FA. A hardware security key or authenticator app is safer than SMS codes.
- Know the trade-off of exchange custody. Coins on an exchange depend on the exchange’s security. Some people use a hardware wallet for long-term holdings, but self-custody means you’re responsible for your own keys.
- Be careful with leverage. Most of the $1.57 billion in liquidations were leveraged long bets.
Bottom line
The key facts are a $6.3 billion breach, about $3 billion frozen, withdrawals paused, and a pledge to cover losses. It isn’t yet clear how much of the rest will be recovered, and the withdrawal timeline is Binance’s own estimate. Figures may change as the investigation continues, and we’ll update this post.
Sources: Reuters via Investing.com, CoinDesk and CNBC, Oct 29-30, 2026. Prices are as reported at the time and will change. Trending status: Google Trends’ top-10 U.S. daily list didn’t show a Binance term when we checked, so this topic was picked from major news coverage (substitute source).