Cryptocurrency use in Turkey began to increase rapidly starting in 2020 as a defense against a deep drop in the value of the lira.
Turkey’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, BtcTurk, has confirmed in an announcement on Saturday that his exchange had been hackedwhile a popular Bitcoin analyst stated that the amount of stolen money amounted to almost 51 million euros.
“Our teams have detected that a cyber attack occurred on our platform on June 22, 2024, resulting in uncontrolled withdrawals being processed. Only some of the 10 cryptocurrency hot wallet balances were affected by the cyber attack in question, and our cold wallets, where most assets are kept, are safe“the exchange said in the statement.
A hot wallet is a cryptocurrency wallet that is always connected to the internet or another connected device, while a cold wallet is one that is offline and therefore safe from hacking.
“BtcTurk’s financial strength is well above the amounts affected by this attack, and users’ assets will not be affected by these losses,” the market added.
The exchange further added that they are carrying out a “detailed investigation” into the matter and security authorities have been notified.
“As a precautionary measure, cryptocurrency deposits and withdrawals have been stopped and will be available for use as soon as our work is completed,” BtcTurk concluded in the statement.
They seem to have located the origin of the hack
ZachXBT, a well-known analyst Bitcoin said in a post on X that he believes that “the culprit is probably this address which I have been observing has been moving 1.96M AVAX ($54.2M) and transferring to Coinbase/THORChain.”
Las Cryptocurrencies are very popular in Türkiyeand the country is the fourth largest cryptocurrency trading market in the world.