Arkham Says $3.5B LuBian Bitcoin Theft Went Undetected for Nearly Five Years
A crypto wallet tied to a little-known Chinese mining pool may have been the victim of the largest bitcoin theft ever recorded, according to new findings from Arkham Intelligence.
In an Aug. 2 thread on X, the onchain analytics firm said it had uncovered evidence that 127,426 BTC — worth $3.5 billion at the time — was stolen from LuBian Mining Pool in late December 2020. Neither LuBian nor the suspected hacker has ever publicly acknowledged the breach, and Arkham said it is the first to report the incident.
LuBian was one of the largest bitcoin mining pools globally in 2020, reportedly controlling nearly 6% of Bitcoin’s total hash rate as of May that year. The hack, if confirmed, would eclipse the scale of other high-profile exploits like Mt. Gox and Bitfinex by nominal value at the time of loss.
Arkham's analysis indicates that on Dec. 28, 2020, more than 90% of LuBian’s BTC holdings were drained. Two days later, another theft involving about $6 million worth of BTC and USDT occurred, linked to a LuBian address operating on the Bitcoin Omni layer. The company appears to have moved its remaining 11,886 BTC — then worth hundreds of millions — into recovery wallets by Dec. 31, 2020.
