On February 22, it was reported that a giant whale account (holding at least one-thousandth of the total supply) lost 1,547 bitcoins and 60,000 BCH, worth about 260 million yuan. The news spread in the currency circle.
The whale who lost the coin was Josh Jones, an expert in open source software and alternative currency technology, and the founder of Topcoin and Bitcoin Builder.
Jones has been involved in cryptocurrency since 2013 and is a veteran in the currency circle. Jones served on Inktank's board of directors until it was acquired by RedHat. Previously, he was co-founder and interim CEO of web hosting company DreamHost. Additionally, he founded ePub Bud and is a director of Group B Strep International. Jones claims to have 43,768 bitcoins in Mt. Gox and is the second largest creditor of the company Mt. Gox.
Suspected to have been SIM-attacked, Jones posted a distress message on Reddit.
Some people speculated that he used a well-known decentralized wallet. This kind of decentralized wallet also requires SIM card authentication, which means that there is a user system that can enable two-factor authentication based on SIM card SMS.
Using a phone number for authentication is a poor security authentication method. SIM swapping is a low-cost, non-technical way for attackers to gain control of a victim's wireless phone account. To mount an attack, hackers need to know how mobile wireless carriers authenticate identities and certain information about victims. Often, getting a victim's phone number is enough.
Beijing Lianan analyzed that: Judging from the current operation, the units dismantled during the splitting process are very small, even less than 1 BTC, and currency mixing operations have occurred during the process. If they are sold to different buyers through OTC transactions in the middle, Even if this chain can be followed up, the ownership of Bitcoin will not be legally defined at that time.
The volatility of the cryptocurrency market has increased recently, with Bitcoin, the cryptocurrency with the highest market value, fluctuating sharply between $9,500 and $10,500.
First, FCoin announced that it is estimated that the scale of non-payment is between 7,000-13,000 BTC, which triggered a chain reaction in the currency circle, and many projects were affected;
Subsequently, the decentralized lending protocol BZX was hacked for the second time, with a total loss of about 954,000 US dollars, raising doubts about the security of DeFi;
Immediately afterwards, the Binance trading platform of the major cryptocurrency exchange went out of order and was temporarily maintained for more than 6 hours. On February 21, Malta’s regulator, the Financial Services Authority (MFSA), issued a statement denying that Binance was licensed to operate cryptocurrency businesses in the country, and that Binance was also not regulated in the country. This also makes the Binance Exchange stand on the cusp again;
Nowadays, there have been incidents of bitcoin being stolen, and it is not an exaggeration to have a bad fate.
Although the digital currency has been clamoring for its traceability, it is theoretically possible to retrieve the lost BTC through double spending (the same digital asset is paid repeatedly). According to Beishu Blockchain, the money laundering activities of the stolen bitcoins took the method of continuous splitting and merging. After over-the-counter transactions, small amounts entered the user addresses of major exchanges. This process is very fast, and judging from the large number of other sources of Bitcoin involved, there is a high probability that a third-party currency mixing service has been used. Obviously, it has been prepared for a long time, and the possibility of recovering Bitcoin is almost zero.
Recovery of trading platform theft accident
1. The hot wallet of the Bitpoint Japan exchange was stolen, and a variety of virtual currencies were lost, worth over 3.5 billion yen;
2. Due to a problem with the Amazon Web Services (AWS) cache system under Amazon, many exchanges have abnormal transaction and deposit and withdrawal operations, and even traded more than 40 BTC at $0.3;
3. The KYC information of the Binance exchange was leaked. According to Coindesk, after the negotiation between the hacker and Binance broke down, the KYC information of Binance users was mass-distributed in the Telegram group;
4. Recently, Monero lock-up transfer attacks have appeared on major exchanges. Hackers initiated lock-up transactions, which caused the locked Monero coins to be unable to circulate during the lock-up time, restricting their circulation;
Although encrypted currency is encrypted, it is not without loopholes, so is encrypted currency still credible?
With the rise of cryptocurrencies, interests continue to drive people to the abyss. Project parties and exchanges are known as harvesting machines in the cryptocurrency market, but above all these are hackers waiting for opportunities in the network.
With the increase in cases, the domestic handling of virtual currency and blockchain illegal cases is no longer as helpless as before. There are already cases that can be used for reference in the handling of such cases. Whether it is a domestic user virtual currency theft case, As for the rights protection incident of the exchange, there are relatively complete solutions in China.
After being stolen by hackers, it is not only a kind of harm to the victim, but also has a great impact on the entire currency circle. A large amount of circulating currency is concentrated in a virtual currency wallet, which will lead to a decrease in the circulation on the market. The sudden concentrated selling of stolen coins will cause market turbulence, easily cause market panic, and easily cause retail investors to follow suit and sell, resulting in a "butterfly effect".
With the improvement of computing power, hackers invest less and less funds. From simple attacks on exchanges and wallets in the early stage, to direct attacks on smart contracts and 51% attacks, hackers' means have been improving. Learning to protect virtual currency assets is becoming more and more important for investors.
Frequent theft of virtual currency, how should investors prevent it
1. Choose a formal platform
According to Beishu blockchain, problems such as being attacked and running away on the trading platform are almost all caused by irregular qualifications and insufficient stability of the system. To avoid these risks from the root cause, the most effective preventive measure is to choose A formal trading platform.
cold wallet
cold wallet
hot wallet
hot wallet
desktop wallet
desktop wallet
The desktop wallet needs to be connected to the Internet, and can be easily downloaded and installed on a PC or laptop, which is convenient for users to use. However, this also has its downside, if the computer is contaminated with a virus, all funds stored in the account are at risk.
mobile wallet
A mobile wallet is virtually indistinguishable from any mobile banking app. At the same time, like banks, they offer the possibility of paying with funds stored on mobile wallets in physical stores. Users can order a magnetic card bound to an account, and then use the magnetic card to pay for daily expenses, which greatly facilitates the life of users.
paper wallet
Paper wallets actually only exist on paper, with a printed copy of the public and private keys used to access user accounts. Among other things, paper wallets refer to the software used to generate the keys and the digital paper to be printed out. Like cold wallets, paper wallets do not come into contact with the Internet, so they are highly secure. However, users must scan the QR code or enter the private key every time when conducting transactions, which is very troublesome for active users.
No matter which one you choose, you must first consider what factors you are most concerned about, and then make a choice. At the same time, it is most important to protect your private key.
3. Avoid being phished
When you need to enter important information, pay attention to whether the URL is the official website of the relevant platform.
Strengthen the security awareness of the wallet
1. Remember the wallet password: Don’t forget this password yourself. It cannot be guessed by others. The stronger the password, the better.
2. Manage the security software on your own machine: prevent the wallet from being stored in the "cloud". If your wallet is not encrypted, and you are running anti-virus protection software with cloud functions, then you will face constant risk of information theft.
3. Do a good job of updating the wallet synchronously and back up the wallet frequently.
4. Avoid using third-party tools. Digital currencies are traded and circulated on the Internet, and there have always been network security vulnerabilities. Even if multiple signatures, third-party private key custody and other means are used, there are still security risks. Therefore, we should try our best to avoid using third-party tools, mistakenly enter phishing websites, and prevent hacking or poisoning.
5. Transfer the coins that will not be sold in the short term back to the wallet: to prevent the collapse of the trading platform, the growth of the trading platform is directly proportional to the number of altcoins issued. If you do not want to cash out during the hoarding period, you can transfer most of the coins from the platform to the wallet Come here, hold the coins by yourself, and you can sell them anywhere in the future, so you don’t have to worry about trading platform issues.
Disclaimer: The information published in this article does not represent any investment suggestion of the company, nor does it constitute any investment advice. The picture is from the Internet. If there is any infringement, please contact to delete it. Please note the source for reprinting.
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Disclaimer: The information published in this article does not represent any investment suggestion of the company, nor does it constitute any investment advice. The picture is from the Internet. If there is any infringement, please contact to delete it. Please note the source for reprinting.
