FBI attributes the Binance theft to North Korea; the platform resumes withdrawals in phases today

The FBI on Saturday attributed to TraderTraitor, a North Korean state-sponsored unit, the theft of about 6,300 million dollars in crypto assets suffered by Binance on Thursday, according to Reuters and Infobae. It is the first official attribution: until now it had only been made by private analytics firms. According to Reuters, the FBI said it had observed members of the unit converting the stolen funds into ether and expects "further laundering" of those assets.

Binance is resuming withdrawals in phases. The first phase begins this Sunday, November 1, between 06:00 and 09:00 GMT (between 07:00 and 10:00 in mainland Spain) and includes bitcoin, ether, BNB, Solana, XRP and dogecoin, among others, according to Reuters.

The figures for what has been replenished have kept changing. On Saturday, Binance said it had replenished 90% of the stolen assets by buying tokens with its own funds, according to Cointelegraph and Infobae; in a message on X posted late on Saturday it raised that figure to 95%, according to Reuters. The rest are less liquid assets that may take longer to obtain. According to Infobae, Binance set aside about 6,340 million dollars from its SAFU fund, its futures insurance fund and its treasury.

North Korea has long denied using cyber units to steal; its mission in Geneva and its embassy in China did not respond to Reuters. Binance has not yet published the full report on the attack.