Canadian Exchange MapleChange Admits to Getting Hacked

Published on 29 October 2018 by Cryptovest Staff

A hack managed to empty out most of the wallets of Canada’s MapleChange, with Bitcoin and Litecoin lost irretrievably.

MapleChange, a niche Canadian crypto exchange, worried traders after suddenly disappearing from social media. The first suspicions were of an exit scam. However, the exchange had just undergone a version update, and just three days later reported a hack.

https://twitter.com/MapleChangeEx/status/1056579816239943681

MapleChange is a full KYC exchange, which led to additional worries about user data leaked. The exchange also had a good reputation for regular communication and user feedback, which has made the hack even more mystifying. The exchange cited an unexplained bug for the hacking, without giving details.

A few hours after the disappearance of the exchange, it started active communication again, opening up a Discord channel and a way to withdraw some types of altcoins. However, some assets remain lost and will not be refunded:

https://twitter.com/MapleChangeEx/status/1056667755691171840

MapleChange is a niche exchange carrying a handful of altcoins that could not be listed to larger markets. The exchange held 62 coins in 110 pairs, but volumes were extremely thin, between $30,000 and $60,000 per day based on data for last week.

What is even more curious is the exchange had extremely slim volumes of around $5,000 in 24 hours, significantly rising since October 21 and remaining significantly higher for the past week before the hack.

The most active coin on the exchange, Conceal (CCX) made up around half the volumes at a price of $0.09. CCX will be one of the assets to be returned to traders. The fact that altcoins remained unaffected and could be returned, while BTC and LTC coins have been taken away, has added to the suspicions of an inside job in the hacking.

While MapleChange is extremely small and one of the rare exchanges ran by one person, with limited resources, the case is one more example of exchanges being the most vulnerable - whether a large marketplace or a small-scale operation.