Bithumb's $44 billion Bitcoin blunder sparks regulatory response, tech upgrade
On February 6, South Korean crypto exchange Bithumb accidentally handed out a mind-blowing 620,000 Bitcoins (about $44 billion) to 695 users (though some reports say only 249 recipients opened their reward)—all because of a simple data entry mistake.
Instead of sending each person a small promo credit (reports differ on the intended amount), they sent them enough Bitcoin to make anyone do a double-take.
Exchange clawed back most of the funds
Bithumb restricted trading and withdrawals for the affected accounts within 35 minutes to stop the chaos.
They managed to claw back almost everything—about 99.7% of the extra Bitcoins—by reversing internal ledger entries; company funds were used to cover the small remainder that had been sold.
Still, about 1,788 Bitcoins were sold by some recipients, and roughly ₩13 billion (about $9 million) remained unrecovered.
Bithumb to upgrade systems
The glitch sent Bitcoin prices on Bithumb tumbling by up to 17% before things settled down again.
In response, South Korea's financial regulators called an emergency meeting about crypto risks.
Bithumb now says it's upgrading its system with an Anomalous Transaction Detection and Automatic Blocking AI System (Safe Guard) and has outlined specific compensation measures rather than offering an unconditional guarantee to cover every user loss—reminding everyone how fragile crypto platforms can be when tech slips up.