The past 24 hours have been extremely tumultuous for Binance as the popular crypto exchange lost $40 million worth of Bitcoin due to a hack. News of the hack came just hours after Binance had tweeted that it was going “to perform some unscheduled server maintenance that will impact deposits and withdrawals for a couple of hours.”
What’s more disturbing is that the company admitted the hackers managed to get their hands on user critical information, such as API keys, two-factor authentication codes, and other information which is required to log in to a Binance account.
Even though users are not going to see any losses on their balance, Binance has opted to suspend all deposits and withdrawals until a “thorough security review” is completed. The exchange estimates this process to take approximately seven days. However, trading within the exchange will continue as normal.
Prior to the hack, Binance had maintained a solid reputation for security, which contributed to its rapid rise as one of the premier destinations for cryptocurrency trading. Due to this breach of a reputable crypto-exchange, the cryptocurrency market reacted swiftly to the news of the $40 million security breach, with crypto asset prices falling across the board.
