The Bitmart crypto trading platform has been hit by an estimated US$196mln hack, according to reports over the weekend.
Funds were taken from the accounts of many of its customers by hackers.
Bitmart said it was a “large-scale security breach” with approximately US$150mln withdrawn in assets, while Peckshield, a blockchain security and data analytics firm estimated the figure to be closer to US$200mln.
Peckshield was reportedly first to spot the breach when one of Bitmart’s addresses had a steady outflow of tens of millions of dollars to what’s believed to be the hacker’s address before Bitmart temporarily suspended all withdrawals.
It was estimated that around US$100mln of crypto assets were taken from the Ethereum blockchain whilst roughly US$96mln was from the binance smart chain.
The exchange added that a security review has been launched into the hack of over 20 crypto tokens including binance coin, safemoon, and shiba inu.
Bitmart is one of the top global centralised crypto exchanges by volume, according to CoinGecko data.
The exchange operator said to be unsure of the methods equipped by the hackers, whilst Peckshield described the breach as fairly straightforward, a classic “transfer-out, swap and wash,” it said.
Rick Holland, chief executive of cyberthreat intelligence firm Digital Shadows, told CNBC that such attacks see cybercriminals combine illicit funds with clean crypto, before turning to currency swaps.
Whilst the blockchain ledger is public, it is difficult for investigators to trace transactions to their destination.
This is the latest breach amid a wave of recent hacks.
Celsius (NASDAQ:CELH) Network last week, for example, lost funds as a result of a US$120mln breach of the BadgerDAO platform.