Bitget: Biggest Crypto Hack of the Year

Crypto exchange Bitget just got hit for a massive $352 million, so far it’s the biggest digital asset theft of the year.

Bitget CEO, Gracy Chen said the hack happened at 6:31 PM GMT on a Thursday, hackers stole money straight out of customer wallets. Bitget has a "User Protection Fund" with over $464 million in it, and Chen says that fund will cover the stolen cash. Withdrawals will turn back on as soon as they're sure the platform is safe.

As for who did it, Bitget says the way the attack went down, based on IP addresses and blockchain tracking, looks highly consistent with North Korean hacker groups. Cybersecurity experts at TRM Labs point out that North Korea is basically the biggest player in crypto theft right now, using super sophisticated tech attacks funded by the state.

So you know, North Korean hackers pulled off an even crazier $1.5 billion heist from another exchange, Bybit, back in February 2025 (if you were thinking of keeping money in crypto, think again).

Crypto has become a huge target for criminals simply because prices have skyrocketed over the years. Before this Bitget incident, TRM Labs reported that hackers had already stolen $1.73 billion across 333 different crypto security breaches in 2026 alone. Other recent massive hits include $319 million stolen from the Liquid Network in September and $292 million taken from KelpDAO in April.

Bitget, which started in 2018 and is currently the fifth largest exchange in the world by trading volume, says the hackers managed to break into a critical part of their backend wallet system. From there, the thieves spoofed transaction data to trick the system into authorizing the transfer of funds.

The hackers made off with a mix of major tokens, including ether, XRP, USDC, and USDT, across Ethereum, XRP Ledger, and Base. Bitget is currently working with law enforcement, blockchain security firms, and the teams behind the affected blockchains, and some of those networks have already managed to freeze the hackers' wallets.

To make matters worse, it's not just exchanges getting hacked. Cybercriminals are also going after everyday users' personal data. For instance, criminals claiming to breach online bank Revolut recently demanded a $3 million ransom, threatening to leak the confidential info of hundreds of customers if they didn't get paid.

Massive exchange hacks like this is an opportunity - sudden security panics can trigger short-term drops in ETH prices because markets panic and traders rush to lock in positions. Plus because CFDs allow you to speculate on price direction without actually holding the underlying tokens in a vulnerable exchange wallet, you don't have to worry about your personal funds getting locked down or drained by hackers.