Kraken, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, recently discovered a vulnerability that could potentially become a hacker’s goldmine.
It all started with an investigation by a security expert who was looking for vulnerabilities in various systems. He sent an email to Kraken regarding a potential flaw. While such reports often turn out to be false, Kraken took notice and its technical team immediately took action.
The discovered error allowed manipulation of the system by crediting funds to your account before confirming the deposit through the banking clearing process. Essentially, it meant that you could purchase and acquire things without paying any fees.
Kraken’s Head of Security, Nick Percoco, believed that this was due to recent updates causing disruption in the synchronization system. Fortunately, this issue did not last long.
Read more:
How cryptocurrencies can help the US overcome its debt crisis
Three accounts eventually exploited the vulnerability. One of them belonged to the initial analyst who made $4 as proof of the problem. However, instead of seeking a reward from Kraken (ethical hackers receive compensation), this person informed the other two individuals about it.
These two individuals took advantage of this and generated millions of dollars’ worth of cryptocurrencies and managed to withdraw $30,000 from Kraken before anyone noticed what had happened.
