Korea’s cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb has asked customers to stop making cryptocurrency deposits to investigate the latest internal embezzlement case.
Bithumb discovered on March 29 that cryptocurrencies worth 14 billion won had been withdrawn abnormally and asked the Korea Internet & Security Agency (KISA) and the cyber police agency to investigate the case. In its newest notice Tuesday, Bithumb said, “As we have already asked for investigations, it’s necessary to fix assets by halting cryptocurrency deposits and withdrawals temporarily. We cordially ask customers to stop making deposits until a separate announcement is made.”
Bithumb’s alleged embezzlement incident became known at dawn Saturday when Korea’s EOS user community “Koreos” announced the position of Britain’s EOS monitoring company “EOS Authority” at a Telegram chat room. At the time, EOS Authority stated, “Bithumb had asked for help, saying there were suspicious acts in the exchange’s EOS accounts.” EOS Authority also said it had confirmed the release of 3 million EOS from Bithumb.
Bithumb released a statement on its position as Decenter reported on this. Bithumb explained in the statement that only the company’s assets, not members’ assets, had been withdrawn. The leading Korean cryptocurrency exchange also said after its own investigation that the abnormal withdrawal of funds was judged to be an embezzlement case perpetrated by insiders and it asked KISA and the cyber police agency to investigate the case. /hyun@decenter.kr
- 사동석 기자
- sahds@dcenter.kr