The amount of funds stolen from the Bybithack, which slipped out of reach, continues to rise as the days pass.
On April 21, BYBIT CEO Ben Zhou revealed that around $400 million, or about 27.6% of the $1.4 billion of stolen Ethereum, could no longer be traced.
This represents a sharp increase since March, when only 7.59% of the missing assets were untraceable.
Crypto-mixer fuel fund disappears
Zhou explained that the surge in untraceable funds was attributed to the use of crypto mixers and decentralized cross-chain services. Although these tools are designed to enhance privacy, attackers are increasingly dependent on them to hide their difficult activities.
He said Wasabi Mixer, a service known for its anonymous feature, was used to wash 944 BTC and was worth more than $90 million. Meanwhile, Thorchain, a decentralized cross-chain platform, has promoted swaps of 531 BTC (equivalent to 18,206 ETH) to Ethereum.
After passing wasabi, we leaked small amounts of cryptography through other privacy-focused platforms, such as CryptoMixer, Tornado Cash and Railgun. The assets have since moved to various cryptographic platforms such as Exch, Lombard, Lifi, Stargate, Sunswap, and more.
Zhou explained that these platforms allowed attackers to shift assets to multiple blockchains before converting them to Fiat via peer-to-peer and commercial exchanges.
Blockchain security company Bitrace has confirmed that
“(Bibit) hackers are dumping stolen funds through OTC channels. Customers from multiple countries or regions report related cases to us.”
Over $960 million can be tracked
Despite a growing number of untraceable funds, BYBIT claims that most of the stolen assets remain visible in the chain.
Zhou said 68.57% of stolen Ethereum could still be tracked, but only 3.84% of the funds have been frozen.
Bibit CEO noted that around 343,000 ETH (valued over $960 million) has been converted to around 10,000 BTC, scattered across around 36,000 wallets. An additional 5,991 ETH, about 1.2% of the total, remains in Ethereum wallets, spreading to over 12,000 addresses.
With this in mind, Zhou urged the crypto community to work with the company to track stolen funds.
He said:
“We welcome more reports. We need more bounty hunters who can decode the mixer as we go down the road and need more help.”
Within two months, the exchange received 5,443 bounty from the Chain Detective. Of these, 70 have been tested and 12 contributors have been rewarded with $2.3 million.
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