The Bybit hack on February twenty first has been described as the largest crypto breach in history. Based on the authorities’ final evaluation, the favored crypto exchange lost over $1.4 billion in digital assets, primarily Ether.
Hours after the successful hacking, it was also revealed that North Korea’s Lazarus Group was the one who pulled off the heist. Multiple reports also disclosed that the crypto exchange ignored some security flaws months before the incident, allowing the group to compromise the cold wallet.
In the newest twist to the hacking saga, Bybit’s Ben Zhou has shared that around 88.87% of the stolen funds are still traceable. Zhou shared these latest developments through his Twitter/X account, stating that 3.54% of the funds are frozen, and seven.59% of the stolen funds have seeped into the dark web and aren’t any longer traceable.
3.20.25 Executive Summary on Hacked Funds:
Hacker began to make use of mixers: 1. Wasbi 2. CryptoMixer 3. Railgun 4. TornadoCash
Total hacked funds of USD 1.4bn around 500k ETH. 88.87% remain traceable, 7.59% have gone dark, 3.54% have been frozen.
Breakdown: – 86.29% (440,091 ETH,…— Ben Zhou (@benbybit) March 20, 2025
Lazarus Group Used Mixers To Hide Funds
In a Twitter/X post on March twentieth, Zhou shared the outcomes of the corporate’s internal investigations into the hacking incident. Based on Zhou, the hackers used several Bitcoin mixers, including CryptoMixer, Railgun, Wasabi, and TornadoCash. Of the $1.4 billion in stolen funds, around 88.87% are still traceable, 7.59% at the moment are lost, and a few 3.54% are still frozen.
Zhou offered a breakdown of the status of the stolen funds. Zhou shared that 82.29% or 440,091 Ether value around $1.23 billion have been converted into 12,835 Bitcoins distributed to 9,117 crypto wallets.
Zhou Asks For Help In Tracing Missing Funds
In the identical Twitter/X post, Zhou shared that around 193 Bitcoins were transferred to the Wasabi Mixer. After transferring these funds to the mixer, Zhou noted that the stolen funds were transferred to different P2P vendors.
Zhou believes the trend will proceed as more stolen funds enter the mixers. The Bybit CEO admits that using decoding mixer transactions is the corporate’s primary challenge. Zhou acknowledges these challenges and is now asking most of the people for help.
Prior to now month, the exchange has received 5,012 bounty reports, and 63 of those reports were valid. Zhou reiterated that they seek more bounty hunters to resolve the hacking problem.
Image depicting hackers in motion. Source: Gemini Imagen.
Bybit Admitted The Presence Of Risks But Ignored These
In an interview, the Bybit CEO admitted they received warnings concerning the platform’s security flaws months before the breach. He added that they noticed that their Secure was not compatible with the exchange’s security framework about three or 4 months before the hack.
Zhou admitted they may have replaced the Secure, and so they’re taking a look at this feature now. Secure’s chief product officer, Rahul Rumalla, defended the product and the corporate, sharing that additional safety features have been added. Rumalla said that their job was not only to handle the issue but to be certain that the identical breach would never occur again.
Featured image from Vox, chart from TradingView
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