Bitfinex and OKEx goes under DDoS attacks

The world’s leading cryptocurrency exchanges Bitfinex and OKEx suffered from simultaneous Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks.

DDoS is a cyber-attack used to make a network unavailable by flooding it from many different sources. Because of the many attackers, it is extremely difficult to prevent such an attack, which is often coordinated using a botnet.

OKEx was the first to experience an attack last night, February 27, as the sudden flood of the access requests caused disruption on the trading platform. Attacks hit once more early this morning. According to Jay Hao, the CEO of OKEx,  futures contracts and options trading had been paused.

The Bitfinex site went offline around 8:00 am GTM shortly after the OKEx experienced a second attack, when users started reporting, that they couldn’t access their bitcoin trades. The Bitfinex announced a bit later, that their team is investigating a possible DDOS attack.

Currently the functioning of both platforms has been fully restored.  According to Paolo Ardoino, the Chief of technology Officer of Bitfinex, all funds remained safe during the whole attack and high-trading-performance is fully re-established.

In turn, Jay Hao, CEO of OKEx, assured the exchange is well-prepared to deal with such attacks and will protect its customers and their funds at any circumstances.

It is still unconfirmed if both cyberattacks are connected. Nor is it clear who might be behind them.