HTX Hacker returns stolen funds to the exchange Cryptocurrency scrgruppen

In late September, HTX — Huobi’s rebranded global exchange — was hit by an attack that resulted in a loss of nearly $8 million.

The attacker stole 4,997 Ethereum, worth about $7.9 million, from the exchange’s hot wallet. At the time, HTX CEO Justin Sun stated that the identity of the attacker had already been revealed and urged them to return the funds for the 5% white hat bounty within a week. In return, Sun promised to refrain from taking legal action.

Funds covered by the stock exchange

Hours after the attack, Sun I was informed His combined belief is that all stolen ETH has been covered by the exchange’s reserves.

“HTX has fully covered the losses incurred from the attack and has successfully resolved all related issues. All user assets are #SAFU and the platform is operating completely normally. $8 million represents a relatively small amount compared to the $3 billion worth of assets held by our users. They only reach two weeks’ revenue.

However, the hunt for the exploiter was already underway.

At the time of the hack, Sun gave the attacker one week to return the funds. Although this deadline was exceeded by about a week, the perpetrator was likely in contact with the exchange, and the grace period was only due to the attacker requesting guarantees that he would not truly be prosecuted.

The money was returned in full

Yesterday afternoon, the funds were returned to the exchange’s hot wallet, according to on-chain data.

It appears that the HTX/Huobi hacker has returned the funds (4997 ETH)

0x48bd1179529343c7a970045290fd2b0b1d946f64e17c443a528e24bf7cdbb817 pic.twitter.com/MknehuhM6x

– ZackXPT (@ZackXPT) October 7, 2023

The deal was confirmed by both security researcher ZachXBT and Sun Himself.

It is worth noting that the full amount was returned, after which HTX returned the reward to the hacker.

“We have confirmed that the hacker has returned all funds in full, as promised, and we have also paid the hacker a white hat reward of 250 ETH. The hacker made the right choice. We would like to express our gratitude to everyone in the industry for their help!”

Generally, when such deals are made, the scalper keeps the promised reward and returns the rest.

It is not clear why the full amount was returned to the sender before the white hat attacker received his promised reward. It is possible that this exchange occurred to remove any possibility of a future lawsuit as the attacker can now prove that he is no longer in control of any stolen funds at all.