Indian exchange Unocoin keeps withdrawals frozen after spotting outgoing ether transfers from its BitGo wallets

Summary

Indian crypto exchange Unocoin has kept deposits and withdrawals suspended while it investigates a breach of its systems and outgoing transfers from an Ethereum address tied to its BitGo wallets, The Block and Cointelegraph reported.

Unocoin first detected unauthorized activity on Nov. 6, when BitGo froze its enterprise account at the exchange's request, and suspended all services on Monday after further activity, according to Cointelegraph; The Block says customers have been locked out since Nov. 9.

BitGo told both outlets its systems were not breached, saying the transaction was signed with the user and backup keys held by Unocoin and broadcast onchain without BitGo's participation, and that its freeze worked as intended but only covers activity routed through BitGo.

Unocoin says more than 90% of customer crypto is in cold storage and that no funds were lost, but it told a user on X it would not give assurances until transaction-level details are verified, The Block reported.

Key facts

• "We currently do not have complete visibility into all potentially unintended transactions across our BitGo wallets," Unocoin wrote in its incident report. (The Block)
• Unocoin estimated rebuilding its servers from the ground up would take four to five working days. (The Block)
• Onchain Lens reported that Arkham shows $0 across 81,000 tracked Unocoin addresses; the exchange has not confirmed its tracked wallets were drained. (The Block)
• Unocoin said it is investigating possible use of the wallet's backup signing option and whether any crypto was lost. (Cointelegraph)
• A Nov. 5 warning from India's cybersecurity agency described an AI-assisted campaign targeting crypto exchanges and other financial firms; no link to Unocoin's incident has been established. (Cointelegraph)

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