Just six days after proudly proclaiming that it was unscathed by the Mt.Gox debacle, another Bitcoin bank - Flexcoin [4]- has admitted that it will be forced to close after hackers stole 896 bitcoin, worth around $600,000, in an attack on Sunday. As The Guardian reports [5], the company shut its website and posted a statement on Tuesday morning detailing the loss..."as Flexcoin does not have the resources, assets, or otherwise to come back from this loss, we are closing our doors immediately."
Six days ago:
We hold zero coins in other companies, exchanges etc. While the MtGox closure is unfortunate, we at Flexcoin have not lost anything.
— flexcoin (@flexcoin) February 25, 2014 [6]
And today:
Flexcoin will be shutting its doors.
http://t.co/SoigZa3WtS [7]
— flexcoin (@flexcoin) March 4, 2014 [8]
“On March 2nd 2014 Flexcoin was attacked and robbed of all coins in the hot wallet,” the statement read. “As Flexcoin does not have the resources, assets, or otherwise to come back from this loss, we are closing our doors immediately.”
Not all of the company’s assets were stolen. In line with best practices for running a bitcoin financial service, Flexcoin held some bitcoins in “cold storage”, keeping them on devices not connected to the internet. Those bitcoins are safe, but only users who explicitly requested their bitcoins be held in cold storage (and paid a 0.5% fee) benefit.
“Users who put their coins into cold storage will be contacted by Flexcoin and asked to verify their identity,” the statement continues. “Once identified, cold storage coins will be transferred out free of charge. Cold storage coins were held offline and not within reach of the attacker. Flexcoin will attempt to work with law enforcement to trace the source of the hack.”
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Flexcoin’s closure follows that of MtGox’s, blamed on hackers stealing 750,000 bitcoins by exploiting a bug known as “transaction malleability”. Several other bitcoin businesses, both high- and low-profile, have gone under. Services including Bitcoinica, Inputs.io and MyBitcoin have all been hacked, each losing thousands of bitcoins.