Key Notes
- Arkham uncovered a massive hack tied to a Chinese Bitcoin mining company.
- The total amount surpasses Bybit’s $1.5 billion hack by a lot.
- Both the miner and the hacker hid the hack for years until Arkham jumped in.
Arkham Intelligence uncovered the largest crypto hack involving a lesser-known Chinese Bitcoin (BTC) mining company called LuBian.
According to the latest investigation, the Chinese BTC mining pool lost 127,426 BTC to hackers in December 2020. Bitcoin was trading around $27,000, and the amount lost reached $3.5 billion at the time.
BREAKING: ARKHAM UNCOVERS $3.5B HEIST – THE LARGEST EVER
LuBian was a Chinese mining pool with facilities in China & Iran. Based on analysis of on-chain data, it appears that 127,426 BTC was stolen from LuBian in December 2020, worth $3.5 billion at the time and now worth… pic.twitter.com/PnIOKgMt0i
— Arkham (@arkham) August 2, 2025
“Neither LuBian nor the hacker have publicly acknowledged the hack,” Arkham wrote in an X post.
The intelligence firm claims that LuBian controlled nearly 6% of the total Bitcoin hashrate in May 2020, making it one of the largest mining pools in the world. The company operated in China and Iran.
Data provided by Arkham shows that the reason behind the hack was LuBian’s algorithm responsible for generating private keys. The method “was susceptible to brute-force attacks.”
The Chinese miner sent a batch of OP_RETURN messages to the hacker addresses, asking for a fund return and promising rewards.
“To the whitehat who is saving our asset, you can contact us,” LuBian wrote in a blockchain-based message to the hacker.
The response never arrived.
Funds have never moved. However, the hacker’s address has received multiple test transactions from Binance, the largest cryptocurrency exchange, in September 2024.
The $3.5 billion lost is now worth $14.5 billion as Bitcoin is trading close to the $114,000 mark. This eclipses Bybit’s $1.5 billion hack in February.
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Wahid has been analyzing and reporting on the latest trends in the decentralized ecosystem since 2019. He has over 4,000 articles to his name and his work has been featured on some of the leading outlets including Yahoo Finance, Investing.com, Cointelegraph, and Benzinga. Other than reporting, Wahid likes to connect the dots between DeFi and macro on his newsletter, On-chain Monk.
