12 Million XRP Reportedly Stolen From Coins.ph Now Labeled in Chainalysis Products

Editing and additional reporting from Michael Mislos.

Coins.ph suffered a possible security breach resulting in the theft of approximately $6 million worth of XRP.
Chainalysis, a blockchain analysis firm, has confirmed that the funds in question are now labeled within their products, allowing their customers to investigate their movement.
Coins.ph initially faced user dissatisfaction due to a scheduled maintenance period, which was later canceled after news of the possible security breach broke out.
Coins.ph has not commented on the issue.

Several days following news outlet The Block’s report of a possible security breach involving the Philippines-licensed cryptocurrency wallet and exchange, Coins.ph, which resulted in the theft of approximately $6 million worth of XRP, the stolen tokens have now been labeled and tracked within analytics firm Chainalysis products.

Background Information:

Within a 30-minute window, a hacker allegedly traded nearly 13 million XRP, successfully acquiring about 12.2 million XRP, which were later transferred to several exchanges including OKX, WhiteBIT, and others.
WhiteBIT, “as soon as it received notification from Coins.ph”, promptly blocked 445,000 of the stolen XRP tokens and engaged blockchain analysis firms Cristal and Chainalysis to flag associated addresses.

The 12.2 million XRP, valued at approximately $6.6 million during the potential exploit, constitutes to around 20% of the Series C funding to Coins.ph in May 2022. BitPinas has shared these insights to Coins.ph before this article is published and has sought the company’s comments to provide clarity on what exactly these funds are.

Photo for the Article - 12 Million XRP Reportedly Stolen From Coins.ph Now Labeled in Chainalysis Products — From Coins.ph to an address where 12.2 million XRP are transferred.

Chainalysis Confirms

The blockchain analytics firm confirmed to BitPinas that while it will not comment on the fund’s movements, the tokens are already labeled in its products.

“We can confirm the stolen funds are labelled in Chainalysis products, which enable our customers to investigate the activity and flag if they are sent to a service.”
Avril Sindhu Anbarasu, APAC Communications Manager, Chainalysis

The inquiry was initiated after The Block disclosed that WhiteBIT crypto exchange contacted blockchain analytics firms Cristal and Chainalysis to flag addresses associated with the stolen cryptocurrencies.

According to XRP Scan data records, at least 477,000 XRP were transferred from Coin.ph to a Whitebit hot wallet on October 17. The Block reported that the exchange only blocked 445,000 of the stolen XRP tokens.

Coins Maintenance Canceled

In a previous article, it was mentioned that several Coins.ph users were displeased with the unexpected maintenance period that began on October 16 and extended until October 18, as observed by BitPinas:

The blockchain tracker XRPScan indicates that the potential exploit occurred on Tuesday, October 17, according to UTC time. (See the first image in this article.)

Then, on Saturday, October 21, Coins.ph canceled their planned maintenance around the time of the news of the hack:

As of writing, the application of the exchange and all of its features are currently working and active. Currently, there are no further comments from Coins.ph’s end regarding the issue.

When inquired about the XRP issue and the safety of their funds on its Telegram community channel, representatives from Coins.ph would respond with variations of the following message:

We understand your worries. Rest assured however that Coins.ph has a track record of close to 10 years in protecting your digital assets in our wallets.
Coins.ph representative, via Telegram

This article is published on BitPinas: 12 Million XRP Reportedly Stolen From Coins.ph Now Labeled in Chainalysis Products