Once again, a crypto exchange allegedly suffered a cyber attack while others point towards a possible exit scam.
CoinBene crypto exchange claimed on its official Twitter account that it was undergoing maintenance, likely a preemptive hint that it had fallen victim to a hack.
Anxious traders responded to the company Tweet in the hope that the exchange had not been hacked and no balances were lost. Some clients who reported that their deposits were pending for hours were reassured by the company:
In order to enhance the user experience, CoinBene upgraded the platform wallet on March 26, 2019. During maintenance, it will affect related operations such as deposit and withdraw, trading will not be affected.
— CoinBene Global (@CoinBene) March 26, 2019
While people were already furious to know about the mess, the lack of specifics about the ‘unscheduled maintenance’ only added fuel to the fire.
As this news propagated, the crypto community at large began to react. Crypto outlet CCN said that some insiders suggest that the maintenance announcement is a cover for a large hack that might involve up to $40 million stolen. Other crypto commentators wrote about strange activity spotted on Coinbene, while some users report that their Ethereum wallets were hacked and attached these two addresses. https://etherscan.io/address/0x6585329751de1140d68bd6cad1b46ebec1131f75#tokentxns
https://etherscan.io/tokentxns?a=0xb3df999c5dc026dea265aeb02b8519844c9b6d5e
#Coinbene claims it has initiated maintenance and wallet upgrade. Users are not convinced.
— Nick Schteringard (@schteringard) March 26, 2019
Tokens have been moved to a wallet commented on as a "cold wallet".
— Stephen Morrison (@HowManyMiles_) March 26, 2019
CoinBene didn’t comment on hacking rumors but explained that it would announce in a separate statement when the maintenance has been completed. The crypto venue also confirmed all related operations such as deposit, withdrawals, trading would not be affected.
The news came up right after a study from San Francisco based Bitwise Asset Management claimed that unregulated exchanges like CoinBene inflate trading volume compared to regulated exchange like Coinbase. The study concludes that nearly 95% of all reported trading in Bitcoin is artificially created.
CoinBene is currently sitting as one of the top 20 crypto exchanges worldwide. According to CoinMarketCap, it has over $580 million in 24-hour trade volume and ranked currently as the 15th biggest crypto exchange.
