Bitcoin Magazine
Kraken Says ‘Dust Attack’ From Sanctioned HTX Wallet Locked Out Customers
Crypto exchange Kraken clients were reportedly locked out of their accounts after receiving tiny amounts of sanctioned digital coins.
In a statement to Bitcoin Magazine, Kraken said the coins were transferred in what is known as a “dust attack” — when small quantities of cryptocurrency is sent to numerous wallet addresses to track and de-anonymize them.
Kraken said the aim of the transactions was to trigger compliance checks by spreading sanctioned funds onto other platforms. Bloomberg first reported the news.
“We don’t know who is behind these attacks, but they likely expect that if sanctioned funds land in a client account, it triggers a full account lock, causing operational disruption for a large number of users,” a Kraken spokesperson said.
The spokesperson added that its customers were briefly locked out of their accounts but its “compliance team mobilized quickly to restore access while continuing to hold the sanctioned funds as required.”
“We are working with authorities to ensure these attacks don’t have their intended impact,” the statement added.
A total of 12,000 such transfers were sent from the wallet to addresses linked to Kraken between this month, Bloomberg reported, citing Arkham Intelligence. Arkham identified the wallet as linked to HTX based on addresses the exchange has publicly disclosed as part of its proof of reserves.
Chinese exchange HTX, formerly known as Huobi, is one of the world’s biggest crypto exchanges. The European Union sanctioned it in July because it has, according to European authorities, helped Russians evade sanctions.
“Recent dust attacks from HTX-owned wallets appear to be an attempt to spread UK- and EU-sanctioned funds to other platforms in order to discredit the broader industry,” the Kraken spokesperson continued.
Dusting has been happening for years. Back in 2022, someone sent celebrities Ethereum from a Tornado Cash wallet one day after the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned the coin mixing app used by North Korean state-sponsored hacking groups.
Celebrities targeted in the 2022 dusting attack included comedian Jimmy Fallon, YouTuber Logan Paul and Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong. The feds said they wouldn’t prosecute the celebrities hit with sanctioned crypto.
This post Kraken Says ‘Dust Attack’ From Sanctioned HTX Wallet Locked Out Customers first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.
Bitcoin Magazine
Bitcoiners Warned After French Tax Authority Confirms Data Breach Affecting Hundreds of Thousands
Bitcoiners have been warned after France’s tax administration confirmed that hackers breached its information system, exposing sensitive financial and personal data belonging to hundreds of thousands of taxpayers and businesses.
Writing on X on Friday, Bitcoin developer Jameson Lopp said the leak was “more bad news for Bitcoiners living in the leading country for wrench attacks.”
Lopp has created a tracker counting wrench attacks — when physical violence is used to steal crypto — across the world. A large amount happens in France, where data has been leaked before.
More bad news for Bitcoiners living in the leading country for wrench attacks. The French tax authority has been hacked and 678K records leaked.
— Jameson Lopp (@lopp) August 14, 2026
26,805 people with income over 100K€
386 people with income over 1M€
8 people with income over 10M€https://t.co/KlT0XqPLFR
The news comes one day after hardware wallet manufacturer Trezor announced a data breach exposing customer data.
Cybersecurity researchers at FrenchBreaches, who reviewed samples of the leaked data, reported that the affected records break down to roughly 392,867 individuals and 285,570 businesses.
Among the individuals, an estimated 26,805 have a reported annual taxable income of €100,000 or more, 386 exceed €1 million, and eight exceed €10 million. The hacker is said to be offering the full dataset for sale for several thousand euros.
The breach first surfaced publicly on August 12, when a hacker using the alias “ZeroBytes” posted on a cybercrime forum claiming to have infiltrated internal DGFiP servers and obtained VPN credentials that unlocked an internal lookup tool covering millions of taxpayers.
According to the hacker’s own account, the extraction was interrupted before it could be completed, leaving what they described as only a partial dataset of 678,438 records.
The exposed sample reportedly includes highly sensitive information: full legal names, dates and places of birth, home and mailing addresses, marital status, number of dependents, internal tax identification numbers, reference taxable income, individual withholding tax rates, phone numbers, email addresses, and records of past correspondence with tax officials.
Security analysts warn that this combination of identity, contact and financial data could fuel highly convincing phishing campaigns impersonating tax authorities, as well as identity theft and fraud schemes tailored to victims’ income levels or family circumstances.
2025 was the worst on record for wrench attacks (crypto targeted kidnappings), with around 55 reported globally last year, according to TRM Labs. Lopp’s tool counted over 70 throughout last year. And this year is already looking bad, according to the tracker: 54 attacks have been documented so far.
Wrench attacks made headlines last year when crooks kidnapped David Balland, co-founder of crypto hardware wallet brand Ledger, and his wife in France.
Criminals held the pair for around 24 hours before they were rescued by the French authorities.
This post Bitcoiners Warned After French Tax Authority Confirms Data Breach Affecting Hundreds of Thousands first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Mathew Di Salvo.
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