Details of the Largest Bitcoin Theft from the LuBian Mining Pool
Date: 2025-08-04 Author: Gabriel Deangelo Categories: BUSINESS
Lubian, which controlled almost 6% of the Bitcoin network hashrate in 2020, was hacked on December 28, when over 90% of all Bitcoin funds were withdrawn from its wallets. The very next day, on December 29, the attackers stole another $6 million, withdrawing funds in BTC and USDT through an address on the Bitcoin Omni network. In response to the incident, the pool management transferred the remaining assets to backup wallets and attempted to recover the lost funds.
To recover the stolen funds, the company used the OP_RETURN function in the blockchain, sending messages to the hackers asking them to return the assets. However, these attempts took a considerable amount of money - 1.4 BTC and 1516 transactions. Despite this, the stolen funds remain intact, and Arkham experts' suspicions are related to the vulnerability of the private key generation algorithm used in the pool. It was this vulnerability that allowed the attackers to gain access to the pool's wallets.
Taking into account the growth of the Bitcoin exchange rate, the value of the stolen funds is currently about $ 14.5 billion. This turns the owner of the wallet into one of the largest holders of Bitcoin in the world, ranking 13th in size.
Meanwhile, according to PeckShield, in July 2025, hackers carried out 17 attacks, during which $ 142 million was stolen. This amount is 27% higher than the losses in June, which amounted to $111 million.
The LuBian incident thus became another reminder of the risks that mining pools and cryptocurrency companies face.
