Binance Hack Freezes Deposits and Withdrawals at World's Largest Crypto Exchange

Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, suspended all deposits and withdrawals on Thursday after what it called a security incident. Al Jazeera reported that about $6.3 billion in funds were stolen, which would make it the biggest crypto heist on record. The exchange says it will cover all losses and that user funds are safe.

For anyone who keeps crypto on Binance, the immediate effect is that money cannot move in or out of the platform while the company investigates. Bitcoin fell about 5% after the theft, dropping below $77,000, according to Al Jazeera.

What Binance says happened

Binance said an initial investigation suggests a hacker made unauthorized transactions after gaining access to an engineer's compromised laptop. In a statement to Al Jazeera, the company said its teams were working around the clock to resolve the problem and were cooperating with law enforcement to identify the culprits.

The company also promised to publish a detailed technical post-mortem once its investigations are complete. Changpeng Zhao, Binance's founder and largest shareholder, said earlier that the exchange appeared to have been hacked.

Reported figures differ on how much was frozen. Al Jazeera's headline put the frozen funds at $2.54 billion, while the body of its report said about $3 billion had been frozen. Al Jazeera did not explain the gap.

Why it matters for people who hold crypto on exchanges

Binance says users will not bear the losses. The suspension of withdrawals, however, means customers cannot move their holdings off the platform for now. The company did not say, in the reporting available, when normal service would resume.

Sean Foley, a crypto markets expert at Macquarie University in Sydney, told Al Jazeera that the theft could shake the confidence of many retail investors because Binance is one of the largest centralized exchanges. He said that could weigh on crypto prices. He also said assets on a centralized exchange are only as safe as the exchange itself, and that bigger holdings make a bigger target. In his view, the attack highlights the risks of such platforms and could push more traders toward decentralized alternatives.

Who is blamed

TRM, a blockchain intelligence firm, said in a report that it assessed with high confidence that the attack was carried out by TraderTraitor, North Korea's hacking unit, which investigators have linked to the Lazarus Group. Binance has not confirmed who was behind the theft, saying only that it is working to identify the criminals.

Ari Redbord, TRM's global head of policy, called the attack unprecedented and a watershed moment. He argued that when North Korea steals at this scale, the money funds weapons proliferation and other destabilizing activity, making it “a global security issue, not just a crypto theft.”

How the theft compares with earlier heists

The Binance theft far exceeds the previous record, a $1.5 billion heist from the exchange Bybit in 2025, which was carried out by the state-backed Lazarus Group.

TRM's 2026 Crypto Crime Report found that cybercriminals stole $2.87 billion in crypto assets across nearly 150 hacking incidents in 2025. By the reported figures, the Binance theft alone is more than double that annual total.

Binance was founded in China by Zhao in 2017. According to CoinMarketCap, it has about $155 billion in assets under management, more than any other exchange.

What happens next

Binance says investigations are continuing and that it will release its technical post-mortem once they finish. It has not given a date for restoring deposits and withdrawals.

Around Prague, based on reporting by Al Jazeera