Japan: 5966 BTC stolen in hacker attack on Zaif crypto exchange
In Japan, the crypto exchange Zaif was hacked. In the process, 5966 BTC were stolen and a loss of 60 million US dollars was incurred. Most of the stolen coins did not belong to the stock market itself, but to their clients.
Hacker attack on Zaif
On September 19, the operator of Zaif Exchange, Bureau Inc., confirmed that it had been hacked. On Monday a "server anomaly could be detected". As a result, Zaif immediately suspended all services, deposits and withdrawals and other payment services.
On September 14, between 5:00 pm and 7:00 pm, unauthorized access to the company's wallets occurred. The stock market explained:
"Some of the inbound and out paid wallets were hacked by unauthorized outside access and some of the virtual currencies we manage were illegally shipped out."
The hacker attack affected the currencies BTC, BCH and MONA. While the stock market confirmed that a total of 5966 BTC were stolen, the exact number of other coins has not yet been clarified. Tech Bureau added that you can not determine the exact damage until you reboot the company's servers. For this, however, it must first be ensured that the servers are not threatened by further attacks.
The stock exchange stated in a statement:
"It is estimated that the total damage amounts to 6.7 billion yen (...)."
Of this sum, 2.2 billion yen are owned by the stock exchange itself and 4.5 billion yen by customers. Tech Bureau advised a subsidiary of Fisco Ltd. to compensate affected customers. Asked for financial help of 5 billion yen.
Investigations and compensation
The statement further stated that the competent authority had been informed of the incident. The stock market called the case a crime and therefore calls for investigation into this matter. But even the company itself wants to make some changes due to the hacker attack:
"At the moment we are checking and strengthening the security and rebuilding the server, (...) to restart the virtual currency deposit / withdrawal system."