The NEM.io Foundation, which represents the peer-to-peer NEM blockchain platform, today announced they have been tracing the funds stolen in the recent hack on the Japanese exchange Coincheck. The flexibility of the NEM protocol allows transactions to be traced in real-time, which aids exchanges to identify wallets attached to any malicious activity. This helps make stolen XEM tokens effectively unusable because they cannot be deposited without being flagged by NEM.
The NEM Foundation said that the blockchain platform itself remains secure, and all NEM mobile wallets and NEM Nano Wallets remain secure and intact.
On January 26, 526 million XEM were reported missing from wallets on the Japanese cryptocurrency exchange Coincheck due to a massive security breach of the Coincheck wallet. The NEM Foundation’s automated tagging system, making use of a decentralized API have been tracing stolen funds from the hack, with the objective of identifying wallets holding stolen funds. By tagging wallet of stolen funds, anybody can easily verify if stolen NEM funds are distributed to regulated trading platforms.
“The NEM protocol’s powerful decentralized API allows anybody to track these funds in real-time, allowing exchanges to determine if deposits were stolen. We’re actively working with Coincheck and other exchanges to ensure proper handling of this breach. NEM.io Foundation will continue to provide updates as the situation unfolds.”
The community as a whole is reminded to take proper security measures, such as using multi-factor authentication and hardware wallets.