US Government’s Crypto Wallet Holding Seized Bitfinex Funds Hacked: Arkham Intelligence

The US Department of Justice has not yet made a public statement on this.

Written by Radhika Parashar, Edited by Siddharth Suvarna | Updated: 25 October 2024 17:23 IST

US Government’s Crypto Wallet Holding Seized Bitfinex Funds Hacked: Arkham Intelligence

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Arkham suspects that the stolen funds are already being laundered

Highlights

This attack puts $20 million at risk
The wallet that received the funds was reactivated five days ago
The incident unfolded ahead of Bitfinex hackers' November court date

Crypto tracking firm Arkham Intelligence has raised an alert regarding a significant theft in the US. According to its tracking data, a US government crypto wallet containing assets seized from the 2016 Bitfinex hack has been compromised by an unknown hacker. Arkham reports that approximately $20 million (roughly Rs. 168 crore) has been stolen from this wallet.

The assets involved in this alleged hack are being transferred to a crypto wallet activated less than a week ago. Media reports note that the wallet's address begins with ‘0x348'.

According to the Arkham website tracking this US government wallet, the hacker executed four transactions to access the stolen funds. The largest transaction involved aUSDC tokens valued at $13.7 million (roughly Rs. 115 crore). The aUSDC token is an interest-bearing asset representing USDC deposited in an Aave lending market.

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In three other transactions, the hacker managed to grab $5.5 million (roughly Rs. 46 crore) of USDC, $1.25 million (roughly Rs. 10 crore) worth of Tether, and $446,000 (roughly Rs. 3.27 crore) worth of Ethereum tokens.

“We believe the attacker has already begun laundering the proceeds through suspicious addresses linked to a money laundering service,” said the on-chain analytics platform posting the details about this incident on X.

𝗨𝗣𝗗𝗔𝗧𝗘: 𝗨𝗦 𝗚𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗸𝗲𝗱 𝗮𝗱𝗱𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗲𝗮𝗿𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗵𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝗯𝗲𝗲𝗻 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗺𝗶𝘀𝗲𝗱 𝗳𝗼𝗿 $𝟮𝟬𝗠.

$20M in USDC, USDT, aUSDC and ETH has been suspiciously moved from a USG-linked address 0xc9E6E51C7dA9FF1198fdC5b3369EfeDA9b19C34c to… pic.twitter.com/UXn1atE1Wx
— Arkham (@ArkhamIntel) October 24, 2024

Members of the crypto community, including crypto commentator and scam investigator ZachXBT on X, are tracking the flow of funds stolen from the US Department of Justice's (DoJ) wallet. The funds appear to be moving across multiple platforms, including the exchange aggregator 1inch and Binance-linked platforms.

funds are going to instantly exchanges looks nefarious
— ZachXBT (@zachxbt) October 24, 2024

The DoJ has not yet given a public statement on the situation. Whether or not legal action has been initiated against this incident also remains unknown.

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The US authorities, in recent weeks, have time and again warned the global crypto community about the rising number of hacks and scams targeting the sector. Despite being on alert, it's rather alarming that a crypto wallet controlled by the US government was breached by hackers.

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Further reading: Cryptocurrency, Crypto Hack, US, Bitfinex

Radhika Parashar

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Radhika Parashar is a senior correspondent for Gadgets 360. She has been reporting on tech and telecom for the last three years now and will be focussing on writing about all things crypto. Besides this, she is a major sitcom nerd and often replies in Chandler Bing and Michael Scott references. For tips or queries you could reach out to her at RadhikaP@ndtv.com. More