Binance under extortion: customer data at risk?

Binance, one of the most important cryptocurrency exchange to the world, he said he launched an investigation after an "unidentified individual" threatened to make public some images that would contain the operator's customers' personal data.

The exchange, in first place among the operators of the sector by volume traded, stated in a statement that this individual would blackmailed the company wondering 300 bitcoin - the equivalent of over $ 3 million - to stop the public release of 10.000 photos that would show KYC data, Know Your Customer, those images that the exchange obtains in order to verify the identity of its users. Such data may include identity cards, driving licenses and face scans.

"We would like to inform you that an unidentified individual threatened us by asking for 300 BTC in exchange for 10.000 photos that look similar to Binance KYC's data," the company said in a press release, informing the community of the situation. “We are still investigating this case for legitimacy and relevance. After refusing to cooperate and rejecting this extortion, this person started distributing the data to the public. "

Therefore, KYC images would be broadcast on Binance but ... where do they come from? According to CoinDesk, the data was probably stolen following a major hack suffered by Binance last year.

The operator's defense is ready, however, who underlined the existence of inconsistencies in the comparison between these data and those of the Binance system, and specifying that no evidence was provided indicating that the KYC images were actually obtained by Binance, as these images do not contain the digital watermark imprinted by your system.

In short, for the moment Binance rejects any charge, and however claims to have started an investigation after that fraudster threatened to leak customer data. Not only that: the Maltese company has declared its intention to offer a reward of up to 25 bitcoins (see real-time bitcoin listing ) - currently the equivalent of about $ 290.000 - for information that helps identify the extortionist who apparently has its origins in China.