$1.5 Million: Cryptocurrency Trading Platform Taylor Suffers 2,500 ETH Hack

Taylor, a company that recently launched an initial coin offering (ICO) to raise funds to help develop a smart cryptocurrency trading assistant, has recently been hacked for 2,578 ETH (about $1.5 million) as well as some of its TAY tokens.

According to a Medium blog post the company published, what truly happened isn’t yet clear, although several indicators point them towards a group of hackers that hacked another project dubbed CypheriumChain for more than 17,000 ETH (about $9.8 million).

The hacker(s), according to Taylor, collected its funds from multiple sources in a single wallet, before transferring them to a larger one, in which CypheriumChain’s funds ended up. At press time, said wallet has 48,440 ETH in it, worth over $28 million.

After the theft, the organization’s team managed to identify an attempt to dump its TAY tokens on decentralized cryptocurrency exchange IDEX. The post reads:

“After that we noticed an attempt to dump the stolen tokens on IDEX, then we asked the IDEX team to delist TAY until we have a clear vision on the situation.”

The company claims to have also contacted EtherDelta, but never got a response. In a follow-up post, Taylor revealed the hacker(s) somehow managed to access one of their devices and gain control over one of their 1Password files, in what they dubbed a “highly advanced and coordinated attack.”

In order to reimburse users, the company is now set to distribute a new token, as the hackers took over 7% of TAY’s total supply. Those who had a balance at block number 5663273 will receive the new token, except for the hacker. The post reads:

“The goal is to make sure the hacker does not receive the new token. We analyzed all transactions made by him, and we know exactly where the stolen tokens are.”

Speaking to Brazilian news outlet Portal do Bitcoin, the company’s founder Fabio Seixas revealed Taylor is looking to hire a company to investigate the incident. He added that he’ll reveal more information in the future, stating:

“Soon, we will reveal an action plan both in relation to company’s operations and what will happen to the token. For the time being, I can not clarify more details about the token, otherwise the hacker might move ahead of our actions. “