Mixin suspends deposits and withdrawals after $200m cryptocurrency heist Mixin Network confirmd on Monday that it has "temporarily suspended" all deposit and withdrawal services after hackers broke into a database and stole about $200 million in funds from the Hong-Kong based cryptocurrency firm. In a statement posted on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, the digital biz said the …
Have always wondered about that - surely several billions dollars worth of radioactive gold is now a) much rarer and b) even harder to steal. Presumably would be an even sounder basis for a currency because it sure as hell would dissuade people from trying to convert their cash back into (mostly) gold.
As much as people like to malign traditional banks, the usual threats to them are not simple theft. Electronic banking generally practices defense in depth, and, while there have certainly been some woeful security lapses, there are usually multiple safeguards to prevent exfiltration of funds by simple money transfer. There seems to be a large segment of cryptobros who resolutely refuse to recognize the centuries, if not millennia, of lessons accumulated in traditional banking.
What luck, I get to use the quote by Stockton Rush, the late CEO of OceanGate:
"You know, at some point, safety just is pure waste . . . . I think I can do this just as safely by breaking the rules."
You mean like ATM's not locking the account before disbursing funds? It took a multi-million dollar heist to get the bank's attention on that one a couple of years ago.
Or the SWIFT system itself being hacked?
Look, I was a vocal crypto-skeptic long before someone pointed out that the CAP theorem puts a hard limit on what you can do with crypto, but don't pretend that the security at banks is actually that good.
The problem is that the cryptobros are smoking their own fumes, and as a result, you get quotes like the above.
But as the crypto business thins out, we're going to see a major uptick in banks getting popped, because in practice, they aren't that much better, and they systems that they are relying on are more than complex enough to be effectively unsecurable.
Having worked in those environments, the audit provisions mean it's all very much simpler (though not simple) to trace in conventional bank account land.
The relative obscurity of the blockchain acts in the crim's favour, though depending on the choice of crypto format traceability is not beyond wit of man. No doubt for such a theft the perps will attempt to cycle the proceeds through a bunch of smaller transactions and obfuscations to try and hide the (eventual) points of sale.
Fiat currency, backed by government policies and the law; versus Crypto backed by vagaries. (And, this is why actual assets have an edge over the intangible).
You can find faults with both systems. You pays your money, you takes your choice!
"How come we don't here about such heists in non crypto banking"
Non-crypto banking has plenty of decades in which to close attack vectors and build up an industry best-practice. And there have been plenty of insider jobs against non-crypto banking in decades past...
Almost all of these involve an insider, whether they were 'in on it' or coerced into participating:
https://www.thrillist.com/culture/most-successful-bank-robberies-of-all-time-biggest-heists-in-history
I'm not usually a hedonist when it comes to schadenfreude, but when it comes to crypto I make an exception. What great joy I keep getting out of saying to the world, I told you so. You're buying nothing backed by nothing. Sure, our national monetary systems are also nothing -- but they're backed by at least intent and a promise. Something is infinitely bigger than nothing.
It's happened so rarely, in fact, that there's a site dedicated to chronicling such things: Web3IsGoingGreat.com. Well worth a read but only for a few minutes; the human body can only take so much raw schadendreude at a time!
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