Blockchain intelligence firm Arkham Intelligence uncovered a theft of 127,426 BTC from LuBian, a Chinese Bitcoin mining pool.
The breach occurred in December 2020 and remained undisclosed for years. At the time of the hack, the stolen Bitcoin was valued at $3.5 billion. Following Bitcoin’s price surge, those assets are now worth $14.5 billion, making it the biggest crypto hack ever recorded.
LuBian ran mining facilities in China and Iran, controlling nearly 6% of Bitcoin’s total hash rate in 2020.
Arkham’s on-chain analysis showed that hackers drained over 90% of LuBian’s Bitcoin holdings on December 28, 2020. Two days later, they removed additional funds from a Bitcoin Omni Layer address linked to the mining pool.
Neither LuBian nor the hacker disclosed the breach publicly. The stolen Bitcoin stayed untouched for years, remaining unnoticed until Arkham traced its activity.