Altcoin News: Alleged Huobi User Data Sells on Darknet for $0.30

August 16, 2019, by Marko Vidrih on ALTCOIN MAGAZINE

This month, it became known about the alleged distribution of personal data of users of the Binance cryptocurrency exchange in the Telegram messenger. However, other trading platforms are faced with problems of a similar nature, claims The Block.

According to sources, the name of the Huobi cryptocurrency exchange often appears in the darkweb markets, where users who call themselves hackers try to sell data, presumably belonging to customers of the trading platform.

The minimum cost for Huobi user data in darkweb is only $0.30. Entries include information about phone numbers and text messages sent during the withdrawal process.

One of the sellers assures that the phone numbers are “absolutely real” and can pay off well provided that their owners come in contact with potential attackers.

“Convert rate is decent for conducting a pyramid scheme,”— says the seller.

The network also sells data from users of lesser-known crypto exchanges, such as BIKI, Hetbi and ZDCoin.

Huobi marketing head Ross Zhang said that the data in at least one such announcement does not belong to his company’s clients. The exchange compared the disseminated information with its own databases and concluded that “only a negligible portion of the phone numbers are associated with Huobi accounts.”

“We suspect that the hacker is using Huobi’s name as a gimmick for their own business interests,” said Zhang.

Phone numbers that are believed to be associated with Huobi users could be obtained using tools other than hacking the exchange platform directly. A company spokesperson said that there might have been hacking of a third-party messaging solution provider, which explains the existence of confirmation codes for Huobi accounts in the distributed information.

“We understand that due to the recent leak from a major exchange, there are growing concerns regarding the leak of users’ KYC data which contains essential and highly confidential user information. However, this issue is different,” added a Huobi spokesman.

Author: Marko Vidrih