the CEO reveals that the funds stolen by the hackers are 1.4 billion dollars

The CEO of Bybit, Ben Zhou, revealed that the total amount of funds stolen from the hacker attack is 1.4 billion dollars (approximately 500K ETH). Of these, 77% should be traceable, 20% not, and 3% has been frozen.

Bybit: the funds stolen by hackers amount to 1.4 billion dollars and only 77% is still traceable 

The CEO of Bybit, Ben Zhou, described in a his post on X that the total amount of funds stolen by hackers is 1.4 billion dollars (the equivalent of about 500,000 ETH). 

At this moment, such a sum of the violated funds seems to be distributed as follows: 77% is still traceable, 20% has disappeared, and 3% has been frozen. 

Not only that, the post states that 83% of the total, which is exactly 417,348 ETH – approximately 1 billion dollars, has already been converted into Bitcoin (BTC), using 6,954 wallets. 

Zhou states that the hacker primarily used the THORChain blockchain to liquidate ETH into BTC. Specifically, 361,255 ETH (or 900 million dollars), equivalent to 72%, went through Thor. This amount can be traced. 

On the contrary, 79,655 ETH, which is 16% of the funds, have instead been obscured through the instant crypto-exchange ExCH, from which new updates are awaited. 

Finally, 40,233 ETH or 100 million dollars, equal to 8% of the total, have instead passed through the OKX web3 proxy. And here too, 16,680 ETH are traceable, 23,553 ETH or 65 million dollars are not traceable and information is requested from OKX web3. 

In any case, Zhou also states that there is strong support in the search for the stolen funds. 

In fact, at the moment there are 11 “bounty hunters” who have helped the crypto-exchange freeze part of its stolen funds, receiving in return a reward of 2,178,797 USDT. 

ByBit and the situation of the stolen funds: the largest crypto theft in history

It was February 21, 2025, when the crypto-exchange Bybit became a victim of an unprecedented cyber attack, which resulted in the theft of the current 1.4 billion dollars in ETH.

Behind this scenario, it seems there is the involvement of the Lazarus group, known for its cybercrime operations linked to North Korea. 

Specifically, the hackers allegedly targeted the cold wallet of Bybit, designed to protect the crypto-exchange’s offline funds. 

The hackers were able to deceive the authorized personnel, obtaining the necessary signatures to transfer 1.4 billion dollars in ETH. 

The hit exploited sophisticated phishing attacks and romantic scams that led the crypto-exchange staff to sign fraudulent transactions. 

Money laundering

This episode has then also moved the authorities, such as the FBI that asked the actors in the crypto sector to cooperate to block money laundering through the blockchain.

The FBI has specifically asked exchanges, blockchain developers, analysts, and other players for their support to identify and block the stolen funds before they are completely laundered. 

Yet, according to other analyses, the hackers still managed to launder 605 million dollars in Ethereum, more than half of the total loot. The laundering would have occurred through complex on-chain operations, raising questions about the security of CEX (centralized exchanges).

Among the most used methods to launder ETH without being identified are the mixer Tornado Cash, fractional transactions, and cross-chain swapping.