On-chain detective ZachXBT disclosed today (15) that the cryptocurrency exchange Gate.io suspected that $230 million had been stolen by North Korean hackers on April 21, 2018, and the incident was never made public. The data on the chain shows that the first transaction of the hot wallet disclosed by Gate.io was also on April 21, 2018. The time seems to match, so ZachXBT also questioned Gate.io’s position of emphasizing “security”.
You talk about the importance of security but how about you finally disclose @gate_io was quietly hacked by NK for $230m on April 21 2018 & how you actively kept this hidden from customers/public
No one in the space should trust anything you say after how that mess was handled https://t.co/0I3t2TnG3M pic.twitter.com/RfESOX2leD
— ZachXBT (@zachxbt) November 15, 2022
Recently, Lookonchain, which has been exposing suspicious transactions on FTX and various exchange chains, analyzed Gate.io’s 4 wallets on Ethereum and found that they only had assets of $479 million, of which the largest assets were 71.3651 million GT and 3139008926439 SHIB, together account for 61% of total assets, while mainstream assets only hold 53,930 ETH and 31.98 million USDT, which together only account for 21% of total assets. Later, Gate.io officially denied the authenticity of the data, clarified that their asset reserves are stable, and announced the address of their cold wallet reserves, but it cannot be ruled out that nearly half of their reserves are their own platform currency GT, and the asset structure is similar to that before FTX went bankrupt.
Crypto.com, which was also recently caught in a liquidity crisis, also reported that 320,000 ETHs were sent to Gate.io by mistake, and then Gate.io returned the relevant funds, drawing attention to the liquidity problem of Crypto.com.
