Forty minutes. Five point eight billion dollars. Binance, the world's largest exchange, has just suffered the biggest theft in crypto history. What happened? This video explains it.

First, two terms. An exchange keeps its big reserves in cold wallets, like a bank vault. Its everyday funds sit in hot wallets, like the cash drawer at a checkout, ready for withdrawals. This time, several Binance hot wallets were emptied.

The hacker had prepared in advance. On the twenty-eighth, they withdrew some money from the mixer Tornado Cash to pay transaction fees. On the twenty-ninth, they wrote their sweeping program and repeatedly rehearsed it on their own wallets.

At around four a.m. Beijing time on the thirtieth, the attack began. XRP, Solana, Bitcoin and TRON. Chain after chain, hot wallets were drained one by one. More than eighteen thousand bitcoins were moved in a single stretch.

The biggest hit was on Ethereum. The hacker obtained signing authority for the Binance Fourteen hot wallet. They made the wallet sign an authorization, handing control to their program. One transaction swept away a hundred and sixty-seven thousand ether, plus one point six billion USDT.

Less than forty minutes, across eight chains. Estimates put the stolen amount between five point three and six point three billion dollars. Nearly four times the previous record, Bybit's one point five billion dollar theft.

Fortunately, stablecoins can be frozen. At around five a.m., Tether began freezing USDT. One wallet was only forty-eight seconds late, and a hundred and thirty million was already gone. Circle froze eight hundred and twenty-three million USDC. Ripple and others followed. Together, they froze more than two point five billion dollars.

On Binance's side, shortly after five a.m., CZ posted that it did look like a hack.

The official statement was edited twice in thirteen minutes, eventually adding: user funds are completely safe.

At eight a.m., Yi He and the official account both said Binance would cover all losses.

As the news broke, markets fell. Bitcoin dropped more than four percent, and BNB fell below seven hundred dollars. The hacker kept selling and moving coins. More than three billion dollars remained unfrozen.

Three things were still unconfirmed: the final amount lost; how the hacker obtained signing authority; and whether North Korea's Lazarus group was responsible. The methods looked similar to the Bybit case, but there was no official confirmation.

For ordinary users, Binance has pledged to cover all of your funds. Some withdrawals are paused, so wait patiently for official updates. Never trust direct messages offering to help you withdraw. This is when scammers are most active.

No matter how big an exchange is, its hot wallets can still be emptied in one go. We will keep following the developments.