Blockchain Hacker Bandit Sends 51,000 Stolen Ethereum To New Wallet

Hackers who managed to steal 51,000 ETH coins started moving their assets. (Photo; Doc. CoinMarketCap)

JAKARTA - Throughout 2024, crypto hacking has become one of the main obstacles that often haunts the blockchain industry. According to Chainalysis reports, losses due to crypto hacking increased by 21% compared to the previous year, reaching a total of 2.2 billion US dollars. The biggest incident involved theft of 305 million US dollars from DMM Bitcoin in Japan and 235 million US dollars from WazirX in India.

The North Korea-affiliated Lazarus Group hacker group is reportedly responsible for the $1.3 billion theft. The illegal funds were used to evade international sanctions.

On the other hand, legendary hacker Blockchain Bandit reportedly started to activate again. After nearly two years of no movement, a well-known crypto hacker nicknamed the 'Blockchain Bandit' reappeared by moving the stolen funds.

This hacker previously stole 51,000 Ethereum (ETH) coins in a simple but effective way: guessing a weak private key. Recently, all of these funds were transferred to a multi-sig wallet with the address 0xC45...1D542, as revealed by independent blockchain researcher ZachXBT.

Earlier, on Monday, December 30, hackers removed the stolen Ethereum in several batches, about 5,000 ETH each. Previously, since January 2023, these funds were secured at 10 different wallet addresses without significant activity. Not only Ethereum, the hacker is also known to have moved 470 Bitcoins (BTC) in the same period.

Traces of the Blockchain Bandit crime have started in 2016, with its peak in 2018. Based on reports from Independent Security Evaluators, the hacker uses a technique called Ethercombing that takes advantage of weaknesses in random number generators in cryptographic systems.

This method allows the perpetrators to guess 732 private keys associated with more than 49,000 transactions. In 2019, the technique has generated around 45,000 ETHs for the hacker.

Although the identity of Blockchain Bandit is still a mystery, security analyst like Adrian Bednarek has speculated that this action may involve state actors, such as North Korea. This speculation arose due to the scale of operation and the complexity of the technique used.

The transfer of Ethereum funds coincided with a downward trend in ETH prices which touched 3,300 US dollars (Rp53.46 million) on the same day. Despite recovering to 3,377 US dollars (Rp54.71 million), the price of ETH still recorded a decrease of 1.04% in the last 24 hours on Thursday January 2, 2025. On the other hand, Ethereum's market capitalization was recorded at US$406 billion (Rp6,577 trillion), with daily trading volume soaring 42% to US$25.34 billion (Rp410.51 trillion).