BTER

BTER, a China-based cryptocurrency exchange, suffered a major breach on February 14, 2015, losing 7,170 BTC, valued at approximately $1.75 million USD. The attack targeted the exchange’s cold wallet, typically an offline storage system designed for enhanced security, as reported by CoinDesk. The theft, announced on BTER’s website, prompted an immediate shutdown of the platform, with withdrawals and trading suspended while the company collaborated with local law enforcement to investigate.

BTER offered a 720 BTC bounty ($170,000) to recover the stolen funds, which were traced through a blockchain transaction and split across multiple wallets, though the exact method of compromise remained unclear. The loss, at Bitcoin’s price of roughly $244 per coin per CoinGecko, followed a prior August 2014 hack where BTER lost $1.65 million in NXT, partially recovered through negotiation.

The incident rattled users, especially given the cold wallet’s supposed invulnerability, fueling speculation of insider involvement or mislabeled storage practices, as noted on Reddit. Operating in the loosely regulated crypto landscape of 2015, BTER planned to arrange withdrawals for unaffected assets later, but no recovery of the stolen Bitcoin was reported. The breach underscored the fragility of even offline systems, accelerating demands for multi-signature wallets, rigorous audits, and standardized security protocols like the emerging CryptoCurrency Security Standard to bolster trust and resilience in the cryptocurrency ecosystem.