### A Stormy Setback for Bybit
The current situation at Bybit can certainly be described as a stormy setback. On February 21, a hacker gained access to an Ether cold wallet on the centralized crypto exchange, resulting in the theft of approximately $1.5 billion in ETH-related tokens. This massive breach sent shockwaves through the crypto community, causing significant declines in major cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple’s XRP, and Dogecoin. Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, is currently trading at $94,943, reflecting a 3.5% drop over the past day. Ether has experienced an even steeper decline of 4.3%, now hovering around $2,631. Ripple’s XRP has lost 6.7% of its value, priced at $2.52 at the time of writing, while the original meme coin, Dogecoin (DOGE), has seen a drop of approximately 6.5%.
### Bybit Hit By Colossal $1.46 Billion Hack
On Friday, around $1.46 billion worth of Ethereum (ETH) and stETH was withdrawn from Bybit’s cold wallet, with a significant portion of these funds subsequently swapped on decentralized exchanges. Ben Zhou, co-founder and CEO of Bybit, confirmed the security breach in a post on X, explaining that a planned transfer was manipulated by malicious actors, leading to the siphoning of funds. Zhou noted, “Bybit ETH multisig cold wallet just made a transfer to our warm wallet about 1 hr ago. It appears that this specific transaction was musked; all the signers saw the musked UI which showed the correct address and the URL was from @safe. However, the signing message was to change…”
Zhou elaborated, “The signing message was to change the smart contract logic of our ETH cold wallet. The hacker took control of the specific ETH cold wallet we signed and transferred all ETH in the cold wallet to this unidentified address.” In the wake of the incident, Zhou reassured users and the broader crypto community that Bybit would manage the loss effectively. “Bybit is solvent even if this hack loss is not recovered; all of clients’ assets are 1 to 1 backed, we can cover the loss,” he stated, adding that all other cold wallets remained secure and withdrawals were functioning normally.
Flashbots strategy head Hasu also weighed in on X, suggesting that the hack does not spell doom for Bybit. “If you want my serious take, Bybit has way more than 1.4 billion in revenue per year,” Hasu remarked. “They are good for the money and will make all customers whole. It doesn’t matter for ETH because Bybit will honor customers’ ETH liabilities and buy back the assets on the open market.”
### The Biggest Crypto Hack in History
The amount stolen from Bybit on Friday is staggering, even by the standards of the cryptocurrency world.
