Everything you need to know about the latest $30million cryptocurrency hack

It’s only been a few days since the last big cryptocurrency hack, in which 30% of the digital currencies belonging to South Korea’s Coinrail exchange was jacked, presumably by some cyber-burglar strapping a mask to their face, shrinking themselves down to microscopic level and jumping down an ethernet cable.

And now it’s happened again, this time a whopping $30 million from South Korea’s leading virtual currency exchange, Bithumb, has been stolen. Bithumb’s 24-hour trade volume was over $374 million, making it the world’s sixth largest exchange.

MORE: How I made £1k on cryptocurrency in two weeks and I don’t even know what a bitcoin is

How did the cryptocurrency get hacked?

It would appear that Bithumb moved a large chunk of Ethereum (a popular cryptocurrency) to its cold wallet recently, because they observed “abnormal access” . In doing this seem to have created an adverse effect as hackers exploited the move and sent in their tiny burglars to solder off a load of microchips full of miniature dollars. Over £30 million of them.

Thankfully, Bithumb has now suspended all trading to prevent any more cash going awol:

If you had your assets holed up in the exchange (did you?), then you’ll be compensated. A representative said:

“[Notice for the suspension of all deposit and withdrawal service]

“We checked that some of cryptocurrencies valued about $30,000,000 was stolen. Those stolen cryptocurrencies will be covered from Bithumb and all of assets are being transferring to a cold wallet.”

As a result of this hack, the cryptocurrency market obviously took a big hit, with Bitcoin falling over $200 dollars within a few minutes of the announcement. It’s a risky business, this digital currency lark, but if you intend to blindly jump out of the world wide web plane and plummet towards the concrete floor of potential bankruptcy, here’s some good advice:

WHATEVER THE BLOODY HELL THAT MEANS!

(Images: Getty)