Every week in crypto, a few crazy things happen, and last week was no different.
Last week, we had an insane $26 million hack in a major crypto exchange, a nice real-estate deal in the metaverse from Forbes, a massive $10 million theft from two of a major co-founder's wallet, and much more.
Here are all of the hottest stories from last week in easy-to-digest, bite-sized sections, for your indulgence.
What is now regarded as the craziest hack of the week was first reported by PeckShield.
According to reports, FixedFloat, one of the major crypto exchanges that operates without requiring KYC, was hacked for more than 400 Bitcoin and over 1,700 Ethereum, worth about $26 million at the time.
PeckShield also reports that once the hacker got hold of the funds, they sent through the Ethereum mixer eXch, rendering the stolen funds untraceable.
PeckShield also reported that a small part of the funds were moved to HitBTC and CoinSpot.
FixedFloat initially put its systems in "maintenance mode" and blamed "minor technical problems" after it got hacked.
However, the details of the hack soon became public, causing confusion and panic In the crypto community.
"We confirm that there was indeed a hack and theft of funds," tweeted the official FixedFloat Twitter account when the truth came out "Our service will be available again soon," it continued.
At the time of writing, FixedFloat has moved their service to a new domain (ff.io), as a way to "reduce the risk of phishing and simplify access".
Last week, Forbes forayed into the metaverse, when it bought some virtual land in The Sandbox.
Forbes announced that it plans to use this virtual land to "establish a presence", as well as to build a community hub within the metaverse.
This new virtual land features luxuries like a luxurious pool, an elegant bar, and a gallery showing the 2024 Under 30 recipients.
The Forbes virtual land will also be used to host workshops, seminars, events and other elements that encourage visitors to interact and collaborate.
Overall, Forbes' entry into The Sandbox marks a massive milestone for the metaverse industry as a whole.
Circle announced on 21 February last week, that it was ending its USDC mints on the Tron blockchain.
This means that USDC will no longer be useable or transferrable on the Tron blockchain very soon, with Circle mentioning February 2025 as the deadline for customers to transfer their USDC away from the chain.
Retail users and non-Circle clients so far, have been asked to move their stablecoin holdings to an exchange or distributor that allows transfers to another blockchain that supports the stablecoin (like Ethereum).
This comes a few months after Circle was forced to respond to accusations that it helps the Tron founder, Justin Sun to launder money and that it finances terrorist groups.
Years after the crash of the Terra ecosystem, Do Kwon is set to be extradited to the US after a Montenegrin court rejected South Korea's petition to have him.
So far, Kwon has maintained his innocence and has claimed repeatedly, that he was merely a victim of a cyberattack that compromised the Terra network.
However, on February 21, 2024, the Podgorica High Court ruled that Kwon should be extradited to the US rather than South Korea since the US had a better case and a greater interest in prosecuting him.
It is now left to the Montenegrin courts to determine Kwon's future by either upholding or overturning the extradition ruling.
Kwon will likely pay hefty fines and spend a long time in prison if he is extradited to the US.
On the flip side, he will deal with a different legal system and a new set of charges if he is extradited to South Korea.
In any case, the crypto industry is set to witness what happens next with Kwon.
Jeff "Jihoz" Zirlin, the co-founder of Axie Infinity suffered a massive blow last week on 23 February, when two of his personal crypto wallets were hacked, and nearly $10 million in ETH was stolen from them.
The hack was detected by PeckShield, which alerted the public that something was wrong with a whale wallet because 3,248 ETH (worth about $9.7 million at the time) had been withdrawn and transferred to Tornado Cash.
It turns out that this "whale" was Zirlin, who confirmed the incident on Twitter.
Zirlin maintained that the attacks affected him alone and that the Ronin chain or the Sky Mavis company were unaffected.
Zirlin did not reveal how his wallets were compromised, but the hackers likely got a hold of his private keys via a leak or phishing.
This comes less than a month after Chris Larsen, a Ripple co-founder was robbed in a similar manner, of about $112 million in XRP.
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