Four ex-Huobi employees have been sentenced to prison for stealing over 40,000 user mnemonics and private keys through a Trojan scheme. This article details their elaborate plan and the consequences.
Points
- Four former Huobi employees sentenced for stealing user mnemonics and private keys.
- The scheme involved planting Trojans and collecting sensitive information.
- Legal actions and fines imposed as a result of their criminal activities.
Chinese police have revealed that four ex-Huobi employees have been sentenced to three years in prison for stealing over 40,000 user mnemonics and private keys.
These former employees planted Trojans in the wallets, enabling them to gather sensitive information, though the exact amount of stolen cryptocurrencies hasn’t been disclosed.
Chinese blockchain reporter Colin Wu explained that Zhang, Dong, and Liu, who worked for a company suspected to be Huobi, started their criminal activities in early March 2023.
They embedded a backdoor program into a crypto wallet software to capture user private keys. By the end of May 2023, they had stored these stolen keys and their corresponding wallet addresses.
After saving this information, they destroyed the server and database. Their plan was to use the private keys two years later to steal cryptocurrencies, hoping this delay would prevent detection.
Elaborate Scheme and Execution
In April, the Xuhui District People’s Court sentenced these men to three years in prison and fined them RMB 30,000 for illegally obtaining computer information system data.
One victim, identified as Ou, wasn’t initially affected by the theft before the planned two-year wait.
However, further investigation showed that Ou’s wallet on another platform had also been compromised by Zhang. Back in 2021, he wrote code to collect user mnemonics and private keys.
For this crime, Zhang Yi received a three-year prison sentence and a fine of RMB 50,000. The involvement of Company A is believed to be the original Huobi Company.
In 2023, it was reported that due to Trojans set by these former employees, mnemonics and private keys of iToken （formerly Huobi wallet） users had been leaked.
HTX, the acquiring company, stated that these actions were the personal behavior of former Huobi employees before the acquisition. HTX has since cooperated with the Shanghai Public Security Bureau for investigations and collecting evidence.
解説
- Details of the Scheme: The elaborate plan involved embedding backdoor programs in crypto wallets, collecting sensitive data, and destroying evidence to avoid detection.
- Legal Consequences: The former employees received prison sentences and fines, highlighting the serious repercussions of their illegal activities.
- Company Response: HTX has cooperated with authorities to investigate the breaches and secure user information, distancing itself from the actions of the former employees.