The crypto-verse has been a witness to the activities of the prominent cryptocurrency exchange, Coinbase. While some of them have benefited both the exchange and the crypto market, a few others have caused major problems. This year alone, the exchange endured an array of issues that even put its customers in jeopardy. Further prolonging this streak, the exchange was seen being exploited by hackers which impacted directly on thousands of users.
Coinbase was one of the first cryptocurrency exchanges and it has undoubtedly stayed relevant as well as successful over the years. The platform went public this year and garnered profound success. Apart from this, the timely developments and upgrades kept the exchange at the top of its game. However, constant glitches with its system time and again put the exchange in trouble.
Not too long ago, the users of the exchange were filled with angst after they received an email regarding the two-factor authentication [2FA] process. While users were just recovering from this mishap, news about 6,000 accounts being compromised over March and May 2021, began to surface.
Coinbase’s MFA glitch
The exchange sent out a message to its users about the same and notified them of “Unauthorized Access to Your Coinbase Account.” All the users that had their accounts compromised due to a bug in the multi-factor authentication [MFA] process at the exchange, had received this message.
In the message, the exchange noted that the hackers had exploited a single bug in Coinbse’s MFA system and garnered access to the accounts of the users. Following this, the perpetrators moved funds out of the exchange.
Further detailing the reason behind the hack, the exchange wrote,
“While we are not able to determine conclusively how these third parties gained access to this information, this type of campaign typically involves phishing attacks or other social engineering techniques to trick a victim into unknowingly disclosing login credentials to a bad actor. We have not found any evidence that these third parties obtained this information from Coinbase itself.”
Additionally, the exchange affirmed that all the lost funds would be reimbursed. Coinbase also noted that it would involve law enforcement and get to the bottom of its latest mishap.
