A bitcoin mining company in Slovenia has been hacked, for
the possible theft of tens of millions of dollars, renewing questions
about the security of the virtual currency just days before it is due to
start trading on major United States exchanges.
NiceHash,
a company that mines bitcoins on behalf of customers, said on Thursday
it is investigating a security breach and will stop operating for 24
hours while it verifies how many bitcoins were taken.
Research
company Coindesk said that a wallet address referred to by NiceHash
users indicates that about 4,700 bitcoins had been stolen. At Thursday's
record price of about $14,000, that puts the value at almost $66
million.
There was no immediate response from NiceHash to an emailed request for more details.
“The incident has been reported to the relevant
authorities and law enforcement and we are cooperating with them as a
matter of urgency,” it said.
The statement urged users to change their online passwords.
The
hack will put a spotlight on the security of bitcoin just as the
trading community prepares for the currency to start trading on two
established US exchanges.
Futures for bitcoin will start
trading on the Chicago Board Options Exchange on Sunday evening and on
crosstown rival CME Group's platforms later in the month.
That
has increased the sense among some investors that bitcoin is gaining in
mainstream legitimacy after several countries, like China, tried to
stifle the virtual currency.
As a result, the price of
bitcoin has jumped in the past year, particularly so in recent weeks. On
Thursday it surged to over $14,100.74, up $1,000 in less than a day,
according to Coindesk. At the start of the year, one bitcoin was worth
less than $1,000.
Bitcoin is the world's most popular
virtual currency. Such currencies are not tied to a bank or government
and allow users to spend money anonymously. They are basically lines of
computer code that are digitally signed each time they are traded.
A
debate is raging on the merits of such currencies. Some say they serve
merely to facilitate money laundering and illicit, anonymous payments.
Others say they can be helpful methods of payment, such as in crisis
situations where national currencies have collapsed.
Miners
of bitcoins and other virtual currencies help keep the systems honest
by having their computers keep a global running tally of transactions.
That prevents cheaters from spending the same digital coin twice.
Online security is a vital concern for such dealings.
In
Japan, following the failure of a bitcoin exchange called Mt. Gox, new
laws were enacted to regulate bitcoin and other virtual currencies. Mt.
Gox shut down in February 2014, saying it lost about 850,000 bitcoins,
possibly to hackers.
