SINGAPORE – There is no way to determine whether any Singapore-based funds or investors were affected by a multibillion-dollar hack on cryptocurrency exchange Binance, or how much may have been stolen from them.
However, withdrawals from the exchange will remain suspended until a security overhaul is completed, The Straits Times has learnt. User funds remain safe and deposits unaffected.
In response to queries by ST on Oct 30, Ari Redbord, head of global policy at blockchain investigation firm TRM Labs, said the funds involved were held in centralised hot wallets, meaning they cannot be traced to individual investors or jurisdictions based on blockchain data alone.
Centralised hot wallets are Internet-connected digital wallets managed by cryptocurrency exchanges to hold and transfer funds on behalf of customers.
As funds belonging to different customers may be pooled together, blockchain data alone cannot identify which investors or countries the funds are linked to. But crypto exchanges themselves may have records that could help identify the affected customers.
“Hot wallets are not untraceable, rather they operate like bank vaults…If someone robbed a bank and took money from the vault, you would say the bank was robbed,” said Redboard.
“It would not affect any specific customer’s balance.”
When contacted, Binance told ST that deposits are unaffected, but withdrawals will remain paused while it “completes a security revamp of the withdrawal service and its related addresses”.
The cryptocurrency platform said on Oct 29 that it had been hit by a hack involving around US$6.3 billion (S$8.05 billion) in funds, about half of which had been frozen to prevent further losses.
When asked whether any Singapore-based funds or investors were affected, Binance said it was “continuing to actively investigate” and, “as a matter of policy”, does not comment on individual funds or investors.
But it added that user funds were safe and that it would publish an updated proof of reserves once remedial measures were completed.
The hack on Oct 29 was more than four times the US$1.5 billion stolen from cryptocurrency exchange Bybit in February 2025, which was then the largest cryptocurrency heist on record.
The Bybit attack was attributed to TraderTraitor, a hacking group linked to North Korea.
The hackers moved quickly to launder the stolen Ether, converting much of it into Bitcoin and routing funds through decentralised exchanges and other services to obscure their trail. Bybit later covered the US$1.5 billion shortfall with emergency loans and liquidity support from its partner firms.
TRM Labs said on Oct 29 that it had “high confidence” the same group was behind the Binance hack, based on intelligence gathered from blockchain transactions and other sources.
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) placed Binance.com, the trading platform operated by Binance, on its Investor Alert List in September 2021 to warn consumers that it was not regulated or licensed to provide payment services in Singapore.
The regulator also ordered Binance to stop providing payment services in Singapore and cease soliciting business from Singapore residents.
In December that year, Binance Asia Services, Binance’s Singapore affiliate, withdrew its application for a licence from MAS to provide digital payment token services here.
Binance said at the time that its Singapore affiliate would instead focus on becoming a blockchain innovation hub to support the development of the global blockchain ecosystem.
Binance.com remains MAS’ Investor Alert List as at Oct 30.
