In this article I will explore one of the greatest robberies in history. We have certainly entered a new age in which bank robberies with guns and masks have been transformed to complex ip routes spanning several countries and untracable network configurations.
What this all amounts to is that one of Japan's largest digital currency exchanges appears to have lost $534m (£380m) worth of virtual assets in a hacking attack on its network.
After Coincheck realized they had been violated, deposits were frozen along with withdrawals for every cryptocurrency except for Bitcoin. Then they looked into their significant losses in NEM, a lesser-known currency.
Coincheck may be unable to reimburse the funds lost on Friday, a representative told Japanese media. If the theft is confirmed, it amounts to the most monumental theft ever involving digital currency.
Another Tokyo exchange, MtGox, collapsed in 2014 after admitting that $400m had been stolen from its network. The stolen Coincheck assets were said to be kept in a "hot wallet" - a part of the exchange connected to the internet. That contrasts with a cold wallet, where funds are stored securely offline.Coincheck says it has the digital address of where the assets were sent.
From my experience with cryptocurrencies this is bad news. I don't think there will be any success in recovering the funds so in that respect this is really bad news for both the exchange and its customers. In an unregulated area like the cryptocurrency space there are few protections so hackers are extremely happy about the current state of affairs.
What do you guys think about this hack? Am I wrong, is there possibility of recovery of these funds? What effect do you think this theft will have on the overall industry?
Please leave thoughts below!
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Source:
Coincheck: World's biggest ever digital currency 'theft' - BBC
Image Source:
BBC