Binance’s November 3 disclosures describe a months-long campaign that began with attempts to compromise employees and ended with roughly $6.3 billion in digital assets stolen. The exchange says attackers used compromised computers and an internal AI tool to reach its wallet systems. The findings are preliminary, and the reported value makes the theft potentially the largest cryptocurrency heist on record.
17
19
48
A months-long path into the company
Binance’s reported timeline begins in June, when a Wallet DevOps engineer downloaded a tampered Homebrew installer while looking for a developer tool. The company detected suspicious activity, replaced the device and changed credentials. But accounts of the investigation say information about the employee’s role and colleagues had already been exposed.
22
36
39
In September, attackers approached another software engineer through a legitimate job platform and arranged fake recruitment interviews. Reporting says a malicious coding assignment was used to compromise the employee’s computer.
14
23
24
Binance later said attackers used a compromised computer and an internal AI tool to access wallet infrastructure. The disclosures describe a chain of employee and system compromises, rather than a simple theft of a single password.
17
19
37
The theft and its reported scale
The unauthorized transfers took place on October 29. TRM Labs estimated that about $6.36 billion moved across 10 blockchains, with most of the transfers occurring in roughly 20 minutes. Reporting on the Ethereum portion describes the use of EIP-7702, a mechanism that can authorize a wallet to operate using smart-contract code. These are reported investigative findings; the supplied accounts do not independently establish every step of the attack.
2
16
The November 3 disclosures describe access to internal wallet systems and the use of compromised computers and credentials. The available reporting does not justify treating the incident as proof that private keys were leaked. Nor does the information here establish a definitive minute-by-minute sequence for the attack and its containment.
17
19
37
What Binance said about recovery
Binance said roughly $3 billion in affected assets had been frozen or secured with help from industry partners, and that it had reserved more than $6.34 billion in company funds to cover the stolen assets. A freeze or company-funded replenishment is not the same as recovering funds from the attacker.
48
The reported replenishment figures differ: Binance’s published update said 98% of affected tokens had been replenished as of October 31, while Reuters reported on November 3 that co-CEO Richard Teng put replenishment at 95%. The excerpts do not explain the difference in timing or calculation.
18
30
Binance also said withdrawals were being restored in phases, with more assets and networks reopening subject to security checks. Teng said outflows had largely normalised and that the company would publish a post-mortem in due course.
12
18
31
Attribution and next steps
The FBI attributed the theft to North Korean actors identified as TraderTraitor, and blockchain investigators also linked the operation to that group. North Korea rejected the U.S. allegation. Attribution is therefore an investigative finding, not a claim Binance itself had publicly confirmed in the cited reporting.
7
15
47
Binance said it had detected and prevented 57 suspected North Korea-linked cyber threats during 2026. The company also said it planned to increase investment in AI-enabled threat detection and work on a security research fund and initiatives with AI companies. Those measures, along with the promised post-mortem, may add detail to what remains an initial account of how a prolonged employee-targeting campaign reached the exchange’s wallet infrastructure.
19
21