Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, said Friday that a security breach affected about $6.3 billion in customer assets, in what appears to be the biggest crypto theft on record.
Roughly $3 billion of the affected funds had been frozen on blockchain networks as of Friday, the company said, according to CNBC. Binance suspended deposits and withdrawals and pledged to cover all losses through its emergency reserve, known as the Secure Asset Fund for Users.
The attack began late Thursday, The Washington Post reported. Co-founder Yi He said withdrawals were expected to resume by Sunday, Bloomberg reported.
Blockchain analytics firm TRM Labs estimated that about $6.36 billion was moved out of Binance wallets across 10 blockchains, most of it within roughly 20 minutes, CNBC reported.
TRM and Elliptic have linked the theft to North Korean hackers. TRM attributed it with high confidence to a group known as TraderTraitor, according to Yahoo Finance. The FBI previously tied the same group to the $1.5 billion hack of the Bybit exchange in February 2025. The Binance breach is roughly four times that size.
Several crypto companies, including Circle, Tether and Ripple, moved to freeze funds connected to the attack.
Markets reacted quickly. Bitcoin fell more than 4% on Friday to about $77,995.
Analysts said the exchange itself does not appear to be in danger. Sean Farrell, head of digital assets at Fundstrat, said the breach "does not currently appear to be a solvency event for Binance."
Binance said it would publish a detailed technical review once its investigation is complete.