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Cryptopia, a once well-known exchange, suffered a brutal hack in mid-January. Blockchain researchers claimed that the Christchurch-based company lost upwards of $16 million in Ethereum, ERC-20 tokens, and an array of unnamed digital assets. As the firm attempted to cool the hot water it was standing it, company representatives kept their mouth shut.
It will also provide an extra layer of security if something goes wrong with the exchange or wallet you are using. It says where possible, the actual cryptocurrencies will be returned, not a fiat value equivalent. Grant Thornton confirms that the Cryptopia exchange will not reopen and that its next statutorily required report in the exchange’s liquidation will be released in December 2020. This ruling also gave Moore and Ruscoe the permission to begin the process of reconciling assets lost by Cryptopia. Before the ruling, there was a lack of clarity surrounding whether the digital assets residing in Cryptopia’s wallets were held in trust for account holders.
According to aCryptopia letter, emailed to its clientele last week, deposits are still shuttered due to the exchange’s newfangled wallet solution. And as hinted at earlier, there still remain a mass of altcoins pairs that remain inactivated, as Cryptopia presumably assesses the logistic viability of introducing support for over 450 cryptocurrencies to its upgraded server. Even though the official investigation is still underway at this time, it seems the company has received the green light to resume operations. All clients who suffered from the recent hack received an email to warn them about the trading being resumed in the near future. After launching the site in read-only mode about a month ago, things have now returned to normal.
The latest developments from reporting from New Zealand news site Stuff on February 18th that more cryptocurrency was stolen from a Cryptopia related wallet on February the 1st this year. Stuff says $62,000 worth of the XSN cryptocurrency was removed from a wallet owned by US company Stakenet. According to the summary of facts from the case, while Glaser was an employee of Cryptopia he raised concerns about the security of private keys held by the exchange that gave access to the numerous digital asset wallets holding company funds.
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Blockchain Security Firm Verichains Identifies Critical Key Recovery Attacks
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Before stage 3 can begin, more users need to participate in stage 1, however. Because the claims process has involved 900,000 users from 183 different countries, the registration and support process has been drawn out. By and large, Cryptopia’s clients were pleased, posting cheery quips in response to the above tweet. However, there are still many facets of the platform that are surrounded by yellow tape.
While crypto exchange hacks are nothing new in this particular industry, Cryptopia has been at the center of attention ever since. Despite claims of an exit scam or a fake hack, the company has seemingly done everything they can to resolve this situation as quickly as possible. The leader in news and information on cryptocurrency, digital assets and the future of money, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies.
What is the Cryptopia exchange?
Stakenet had not lost funds in the 2019 hack and had been hoping to eventually receive all its assets back. William Laurier is a writer and crypto enthusiast who is passionate about the potential of blockchain technology. He has been involved in the cryptocurrency community since early 2017 and is excited to see where the industry cryptopia loss marker goes in the years ahead. William believes in the power of decentralized systems to create a more equitable and efficient future. He is very excited to be part of the blockchain community and constantly looking for new ways to learn and contribute. The company’s shares are 100% owned by Hong Kong resident Joseph Pereira.
- In November 2020 Grant Thornton issued a warning to Cryptopia account holders after a New Zealand court mistakenly released Cryptopia customer data to an “unauthorised third party”.
- When he caught wind through an inside source that the liquidators were reviewing the deposit wallets, Glaser decided to confess and offer the return of the stolen crypto.
- William believes in the power of decentralized systems to create a more equitable and efficient future.
This led to a review of the Cryptopia wallets by Grant Thornton, which led to a discovery that 13 bitcoins had been withdrawn by an unauthorized party in a series of transactions. Some of the bitcoin had gone through a mixing service designed to hide the identity of the withdrawer. After the hack, during the liquidation process, all Cryptopia workers’ contracts https://cryptolisting.org/ were terminated but Glaser kept his copy of the exchange’s private keys. Grant Thornton explains in their update that stage 2 — Identity Verification — has been a staggered process because Cryptopia users are domiciled across 183 different countries. But, in the middle of February, local authorities gave the exchange an A-OK to resume trading.
Entrepreneurial Reasons to Invest in Cryptocurrency
Pereira is also a director of the company, along with Christchurch based Thomas Cattermole and Deon Swiggs, and US based Charles Harman. In November 2020 Grant Thornton issued a warning to Cryptopia account holders after a New Zealand court mistakenly released Cryptopia customer data to an “unauthorised third party”. In September, a previous Cryptopia client reported accidentally depositing bitcoin to an old Cryptopia deposit wallet.
All things considered, it seems things are coming together for the company. One can only hope their platform is now more secure than ever before, as another hack could be catastrophic for this exchange. Cryptopiaannounced their trading platform got hacked several months ago.
How to prevent lost of Crypto assets in the future?
Change the wallet network in the MetaMask Application to add this contract. Grant Thornton also reports that they have received orders permitting them to convert NZ$5 million worth of DOGE .
On the 28th of March 2022, Grant Thornton, the liquidators of failed cryptocurrency exchange Cryptopia, released an update to stakeholders and claimants. The accounting and financial services firm reports that stage 2 of the claims process is still ongoing after being executed around 6 months ago in October 2021. Cryptopia is a leading New Zealand based crypto exchange that has provided users with an advanced platform to buy and sell cryptocurrencies since 2014. It has become one of the most popular exchanges in the industry due to its user-friendly interface, wide range of coins, and low fees.
By 2018, Cryptopia had more than 80 staff members and a user base of ~1.4 million. Included in the outgoings was NZ$1.7M in fees to Grant Thornton, NZ$1.2M in legal fees, NZ$649,187 for server hosting, NZ$714,143 in salaries to Cryptopia employees and NZ$489,104 in GST payments to NZ’s Inland Revenue department. Issues stem from the difficult nature of some of the questions used in the verification process.
Although the platform supports more coins than just this list, those markets will be reopened at a later undisclosed date. It is an important first step in the right direction to keep users happy and engaged. However, exchange enthusiasts also have to keep in mind the company is still in the process of clearing up a lot of loose ends, thus no miracles should be expected. The most effective way to prevent the loss of crypto assets is by using an updated ledger system and avoiding leaving large amounts of money in one wallet or exchange. A ledger system will keep track of all transactions and holdings, making it easier for users to monitor their accounts.