HOYA BIT, a cryptocurrency exchange based in Taiwan, said it was hit by a hack on January 22 after abnormal withdrawals were detected from its hot wallet. Monitoring from on-chain analytics platform Arkham showed that a wallet address closely linked to the exchange, beginning with 0xBA5, saw its balance fall from about $1 million to just $1,000. The balance later recovered to around $200,000.
Exchange paused services and reviewed key wallet controls
In a statement issued early on January 23, HOYA BIT said it suspended platform services immediately after spotting the irregular activity during routine operations. The exchange said it then carried out a full review and reinforcement of its hot wallet structure, covering critical areas such as API keys, signing permissions, and backend administrative access.
The company said its wallet system separates cold and hot storage, and that the attack only involved the platform’s own assets held in the hot wallet. User funds, it said, remained stored in vaults and offline cold wallets and were not affected. The exchange also stated that no user personal data was compromised.
Estimated losses range from $600,000 to $800,000
Based on on-chain estimates, losses from the incident were roughly $600,000 to $800,000. The outflowing wallet consolidated multiple transfers and sent funds to ChangeNOW and Uniswap. Those movements are now part of the tracking process.
HOYA BIT said it has brought in third-party forensic specialists and launched on-chain tracing efforts, while staying in contact with partners and law enforcement agencies. The platform had briefly halted operations, and it said all services have now returned to normal.