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New Zealand-Based Cryptopia Exchange Suffers Hacker Attack, Exit Scam Suspected

Tue, 01/15/2019 - 12:34
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Yuri Molchan
The Cryptopia exchange located in New Zealand shuts down its Internet presence while it deals with the consequences of a major hack
New Zealand-Based Cryptopia Exchange Suffers Hacker Attack, Exit Scam Suspected
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On the morning of Tuesday, Jan. 15, the exchange tweeted that someone had broken its security systems, causing extensive losses.

Cryptopia has not provided any details as to how many and what assets exactly have been stolen by the evil-makers or whether it plans on reimbursing the platform’s users.

Cryptopia goes offline

The website of the exchange, as well as the technical support page and its blog, is not accessible presently. All the website shows is a notice: “Cryptopia is currently in unscheduled maintenance mode. We will be back soon.”

New Zealand Exchange Gets Hacked, Around 13,000 ETH Lost

An exit scam?

However, Whale Alert tweets that on Sunday, January 13, Etherscan recorded a transaction from Cryptopia’s hot wallets. Nearly 13,400 ETH coins were moved out (around $2.44 mln), as well as around 48 mln CENNZ tokens (around $1.18 mln). The community is pondering whether this was the hacker or the exchange itself, conducting an exit scam.

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New Zealand Exchange Gets Hacked, Around 13,000 ETH Lost

The right people have been notified

The exchange also tweeted that all appropriate authorities have been notified, as well as the police of New Zealand. Apparently, now there is a massive investigation underway where the local police and the High-Tech Crimes Unit are collaborating.

Cryptopia encourages its customers to stay positive regarding the event by posting the following announcement:

“Until this has been carried out, The Cryptopia Exchange will remain in maintenance mode, with trading suspended. We are committed to getting this resolved as quickly as possible and will keep you all updated every step of the way.”

Ethereum’s Constantinople

Less than a week ago, Cryptopia got in the line of the exchanges that support the upcoming Constantinople hard fork of Ethereum — the line includes HitBTC and nearly 20 other exchanges, as U.Today reported earlier.

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About the author

Yuri is a crypto journalist interested in technology and technical innovations. He has been in crypto since 2017. Believes that blockchain and cryptocurrencies have a potential to transform the world in the future in many of its aspects. ‘Hodls’ major cryptocurrencies and has written for multiple crypto media outlets. 

His articles have been quoted by such crypto influencers as Tyler Winklevoss, John McAfee, CZ Binance, Max Keiser, etc.

Currently Yuri is a news writer at U.Today and can be contacted at yuri.molchan@u.today.