rewrite this title BtcTurk hack sees $48 million in crypto vanish from hot wallets

Turkish crypto exchange BtcTurk has been targeted by a major cyberattack, which resulted in the theft of roughly $48 million in digital assets.

On Aug. 14, blockchain security firm Cyvers reported that the stolen funds were moved across multiple networks, including Ethereum, Avalanche, Arbitrum, Base, Optimism, Mantle, and Polygon.

Most of the assets were transferred to just two addresses, where the attacker has reportedly begun swapping them.

BtcTurk confirmed the hack in a post on X, emphasizing that only hot wallets were affected. The firm is one of the largest crypto exchanges in the country and has over five million users.

According to the firm:

“During checks conducted on August 14, 2025, unusual activity was detected in our hot wallets. As a precaution, cryptocurrency deposit and withdrawal transactions have been temporarily suspended. These services will be reactivated once the work is completed.”

The company assured users that most assets remain safely stored in cold wallets and that the incident will not impact customer holdings. It added that trading operations and Turkish Lira transactions are continuing normally.

BtcTurk furthered that the authorities have been notified and are coordinating closely with cybersecurity teams to secure its infrastructure.

This attack follows a similar incident roughly a year ago, when BtcTurk’s hot wallets were targeted, resulting in significant losses of more than $55 million.

At that time, the exchange clarified that only a portion of ten cryptocurrencies in hot wallets were affected, while cold wallet holdings remained untouched.

Centralized exchanges under attack

This latest BtcTurk hacking incident adds to the growing list of attacks centralized crypto trading platforms have experienced this year.

Earlier in the year, Bybit, one of the most prominent crypto exchanges, suffered a hack that stole approximately $1.5 billion in Ethereum tokens. 

Since then, other major crypto trading platforms like India-based CoinDCX have also lost over $44 million.

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