Bitget Exchange Faces Major Wallet Breach, Over $180 Million in Crypto Vulnerable

Update, 6:20 p.m. ET: According to Bitget's CEO, Gracy Chen, the exchange identified unauthorized withdrawals from its hot and warm wallets around 2:31 p.m. ET, which impacted approximately $351.6 million. While withdrawals have been halted, Chen reassured that cold wallets are unaffected and that Bitget’s User Protection Fund, boasting over $464 million, will cover the losses.

On Thursday afternoon, the cryptocurrency exchange Bitget reportedly encountered a serious security breach involving its wallet systems. Blockchain records indicate that a newly generated address siphoned over $180 million in assets from wallets associated with Bitget between 2:31 p.m. and 4:55 p.m. ET. The transaction history on Etherscan has titled this receiving address as Bitget Exploiter 1. Meanwhile, Bitget Wallet, a distinct self-custodial service by the exchange, confirmed that its systems and user assets are unaffected by this incident.

At approximately 5 p.m. ET, the exchange had not publicly addressed the situation. In the meantime, numerous users reported their transactions were facing delays in processing.

Transaction Flow Analysis

The initial suspicious transfer began with a test transfer of 0.84 ETH to the new address, recorded at 2:31 p.m. ET. Within a half-hour, this address had received roughly $34.75 million in USDT, $12.85 million in USDC, and about 3,000 XAUT (Tether’s gold-backed token), valued near $12.8 million.

Subsequently, approximately 24,373 ETH (around $65 million) were transferred from Bitget's hot wallet, labeled as Bitget 6, along with additional funds from another labeled wallet, Bitget 35. This second wallet also contributed 821,012 AVAX, roughly worth $8.5 million, on the Avalanche network.

Following these transfers, the collected assets quickly shifted to a secondary address where they were converted to approximately 22,600 ETH within about 40 minutes. Importantly, while Tether and Circle have the capacity to freeze transactions involving USDT and USDC, trading activity in ETH remains unalterable.

By late afternoon, the withdrawals didn’t cease. By 4:55 p.m. ET, an additional 8.2 million USDC was sent from Bitget 6 to the same receiving address on Avalanche. By the end of the reporting time, around 48,800 ETH (close to $131 million) were spread across four wallets recognized as Bitget exploiters by Etherscan. An Arkham tracker has documented around $183.8 million being routed from Bitget wallets across six networks, which include Arbitrum and BNB Chain. It’s essential to note that the tracker illustrates funds transitioning between these chains via bridges like Stargate and Celer’s cBridge.

Potential XRP Transactions

There might be additional sums unaccounted for. Notably, two XRP wallets, labeled on XRPScan as belonging to Bitget, transferred 93.7 million XRP (approximately $143 million) to a newly created address shortly after some Ethereum withdrawals, but it's unclear if this address is related to the ongoing exploit.

Furthermore, some analysts on X reported a movement of 19.67 million USDT0 from a Bitget exchange hot wallet on Arbitrum that transitioned into roughly 7,111 ETH; verification of this remains pending.

The precise method of how these wallets were compromised is still under investigation, and whether user funds are affected remains uncertain. This breach draws parallels to the previous security incident where North Korea’s Lazarus Group successfully executed a $1.5 billion theft from Bybit.

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*Update, Friday, Sept. 25, 2026, 6:15 p.m. ET: This article clarifies that the affected wallets belong to Bitget exchange, distinct from Bitget Wallet, and incorporates a statement from a Bitget Wallet spokesperson. Furthermore, the headline has been adjusted to exclude references to cold wallets, which Bitget confirmed were not breached.

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