$590M BNB moved to Tether-blacklisted wallet amid rumors of Binance hack
Two million BNB tokens worth approximately $590 million were transferred to a newly created wallet to an address blacklisted by Tether. The blacklisting, highlighted by his Tether bot on Twitter, ignited rumors of his one of the biggest hacks of the year.
[2022/10/06 21:24] USDT blacklisted 0x489a8756c18c0b8b24ec2a2b9ff3d4d447f79bec at block 15691728 https://t.co/qhyr8eHU84
— usdt blacklist (@usdtblacklist) October 6, 2022
MevRefund made the event public by posting a suspicious transaction involving 1 million BNB on Twitter, claiming that a hack may be in progress. Rumors that the deal is related to some form of hacking have yet to be confirmed. However, the recipient’s wallet, 0x489A…7F79BEc, has been blacklisted by his Tether, suggesting that something malicious may be on the way.
Looks like a huge hack of 2M BNB
Here is one tx: https://t.co/yeRYhy2PzC
— MevRefund (@MevRefund) October 6, 2022
MevRefund confirmed in subsequent tweets that it was blacklisted via on-chain data.
A hack looks more likely: pic.twitter.com/JB1upZ9Ad0
— MevRefund (@MevRefund) October 6, 2022
At press time, Binance CEO CZ has not commented on the transaction. His last tweet, which came an hour before the information became known to the public, said: It’s cryptoflow. Since then, Tweetnearly $500 million in BNB passed through a wallet that is now blacklisted.
Green Jeff claimed on Twitter that the wallet he received bridged BNB tokens and then used the funds to leverage DeFi play. of crypto slate Our analysis also came to this conclusion, as on-chain data shows large deposits into Venus using BNB as collateral to swap tokens for stablecoins.
Some Gigwale (possibly Binance) are doing massive on-chain leveraged play in real-time.
Looks like a huge concentrated bet: long $ETH vs stablecoins $BNB collateral.https://t.co/5GFCv8AEzR
— GREEN JEFF (The Bread #9) (@jeffthedunker) October 6, 2022
However, further analysis by Green Jeff confirmed that Tether’s blacklist may indicate malicious activity. Green Jeff commented that “the activity doesn’t really look like a hack”, but questioned why Tether is moving faster than his Binance. He further speculated that if this was related to some kind of exploit, Binance itself could be a victim.
Another theory is that the Ethereum held in the wallet may have been sent to Tornado Cash. However, only about 20% of the total wallet value has been converted into his ETH.
Blacklisted by Tether. I’m really curious how they are ahead of Binance.
Otherwise, it’s a very big dark money sitting in BNB waiting to finish.
probably, $ETH Tornado for a long time, eventuallyhttps://t.co/ciOKRNp2jG
— GREEN JEFF (The Bread #9) (@jeffthedunker) October 6, 2022
The price of BNB plummeted by 5% during the period the wallet was active, giving up gains made since the beginning of October.
There is no confirmation that the event was the result of a hack or exploit. However, further analysis is required.
The BNB chain is now suspended, further indicating the involvement of malicious actors.
.@BNB chain is currently undergoing maintenance.
We are temporarily suspending all deposits and withdrawals through the BNB chain until further updates.
We apologize for the inconvenience. Thank you for your patience!
— Binance (@binance) October 6, 2022
This is a developing story. Further information will be reported as it becomes available.
