Billions of dollars worth value of bitcoin and other digital currencies were wiped off after a cyber-heist at a little-known virtual currency exchange in South Korea.
South Korea has emerged as a hotbed for trading in virtual currencies over the last year. Coinrail is one of its less-well-known trading platforms.
Bitcoin’s price dropped by more than 7% just after South Korea’s Coinrail announced that cyber-thieves had targeted its platform. In a Monday statement, the exchange reported a security breach in which hackers stole about 30% of its virtual currencies. Coinrail temporarily suspended digital currency trading following the incident. The exchange is entirely cooperating with investigators to try to track down the lost funds. The exchange did not disclose the exact worth of tokens stolen. The theft was of less popular cryptocurrencies in place of famous ones like Bitcoin itself.
Still, the news sent has shaken the virtual currency markets. Along with bitcoin, prices of other commonly traded digital currencies like ethereum also sunk. Data shows that nearly $30 billion in cryptocurrency wealth vanished within about seven hours of trading.
Bitcoin was trading at around $6,750 in early afternoon trading in Asia. That’s very near to the lowest level in about two months and is around half the price at which it started the year.