A massive cyberattack on the Binance cryptocurrency exchange has drawn the attention of US banking regulators. Following the theft of digital assets worth approximately $6.3 billion, supervisory bodies have reached out to American banks to determine whether their systems contain vulnerabilities that could pose similar risks to the traditional financial sector.
Reuters reported this on November 5, citing sources familiar with the situation. There is no information about confirmed hacks of American banks in connection with this attack.
The Binance hack itself occurred on October 29. According to the exchange's own estimate, the attackers gained access to digital assets with a total value of about $6.34 billion. The incident affected hot cryptocurrency wallets used for conducting transactions with digital assets.
In a preliminary report dated November 3, Binance reported that the attackers exploited unauthorized access to an internal transaction signing service. This allowed them to make transfers outside the normal withdrawal procedure.
The exchange's investigation points to a sophisticated multi-stage attack that employed social engineering, malicious software, and compromise of internal tools. In particular, the attackers were able to exploit the transaction authorization mechanism on the Ethereum network, which made it harder to block the illicit movement of assets.
After detecting the attack, Binance temporarily suspended withdrawals, restricted compromised permissions, and began rebuilding its infrastructure. According to the exchange, as of November 3, it managed to freeze or intercept digital assets worth approximately $2.85 billion.
The company also stated that it assumed the financial consequences of the incident and allocated sufficient funds of its own to cover customer losses. According to its data, as of October 31, it had restored the backing for 98% of the affected tokens. Importantly, this refers to replenishing the exchange's reserves, not to recovering 98% of the stolen assets from the attackers.
The incident has once again raised questions about the differences between the protection of cryptocurrency platforms and traditional banks. As CoinDesk notes, citing cybersecurity experts, the initial methods of infiltrating financial institutions' systems can be similar. However, the consequences of stealing funds differ significantly.
In particular, bank transfers can in some cases be stopped or recalled through payment control mechanisms. In contrast, confirmed transactions on most blockchain networks usually cannot be reversed. At the same time, issuers of certain digital tokens have the technical ability to freeze stolen assets.
Experts interviewed by CoinDesk point out that for large cryptocurrency platforms, multi-level transaction approval, withdrawal limits, and segregation of duties among employees and systems are critically important. It is precisely the operational mechanisms of wallet management that can become a weak point even when the cryptographic security of the blockchain has not been compromised.
Binance has already reported strengthening controls on employee devices, updating wallet management systems, and expanding tools for detecting suspicious activity. The exchange is also engaging independent specialists for additional cybersecurity audits.
For the banking sector, the main question is not the possibility of a direct repeat of a cryptocurrency theft, but the security of its own infrastructure against similar infiltration methods. As traditional financial services and the digital asset market converge, operational and cyber risks require increasing attention from participants in both sectors.
