Binance today updated on the alleged leak of its customers’ KYC information, saying that although its probes are still ongoing, the cryptocurrency Exchange will compensate users who fell victim to the hacking scandal with a lifetime Binance VIP membership.
Binance notified its user base about its VIP user promotion, which offers trading fees discounts and other preferential services. The move has been planned to express gratitude to its community through its recent tough period, though it continues to distance itself from the issue and still does not admit that it was at fault.
The premier trading platform also provided further details about the ongoing investigations, which affect up to 60,000 users who sent personal information to the company, through its official blog post. Specifically, it said its latest probe indicates that some of the images released thus far overlap with those processed by a third-party vendor that was processing its KYC verifications around the hack time.
Binance confirmed it contracted this vendor between early December 2017 and February 2018. The KYC documents included driving licenses, passports, and even fingerprints.
Binance CEO says “it’s KYC leak FUD”
Binance also repeated claims regarding the authenticity of information circulated on Telegram channels. It said this material lacked a digital watermark that it typically uses for its internal information, and as such, there’s no evidence to show it’s directly coming from the exchange itself.
“During our review of the leaked images, there were multiple photoshopped or otherwise altered images which do not match the KYC images in our database and are being accounted into the comprehensive investigation. In addition, every image processed through Binance for KYC purposes is embedded with a concealed digital watermark, which was notably absent from all of the leaked images,” the globally biggest digital currency platform explains.
Binance revealed earlier this month that a pro-claimed hacker previously demanded 300 BTC from it for “withholding 10,000 photos that bear similarity to Binance KYC data.” After he refused to give the team any irrefutable evidence regarding the source of breach, Binance ended conversation, but the hacker then started distributing the KYC data online and to media outlets.
Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, while warned people not to fall for the “KYC leak FUD”, also announced a 25 BTC reward to anyone who can provide helpful information to reveal the identity of the hacker.
