After a short delay, the Gatecoin team launched their promised withdrawal platform to return user’s trapped funds. The Hong-Kong-based-exchange disclosed on May 13 a breach in their platform resulting in the loss of 185,000 ETH and 250 BTC.
Gatecoin successfully launched their bespoke platform for withdrawals, the exchange began processing the user’s transactions at May 28, 10pm HKT (2pm GMT). The platform was to start earlier that day, but the team needed more time for tests:
Our engineers need a few more hours for additional testing. We apologise for the further delay.
The website is now showing a trimmed down version of the pre-hack landing page, users can access their funds and process withdrawals of BTC, DGD, DAO, HKD, USD, and EUR. The company has reiteratively expressed that all client data is safe and secure as the databases were untouched during the breach.
In Gatecoin’s subreddit users can find a dedicated post on the latest events and relevant information, the company has announced that they are finalizing a funding agreement to cover for the stolen ETH funds, Series A investors, as well as a $3 million bond issuance, will provide the funds to buy the 185,000 ETH required to cover all losses, therefore, ether withdrawals aren’t yet available.
Aurélien Menant, CEO of the exchange explained that DAO tokens were still at risk, due to the fact that they are linked to Ethereum accounts -which was the main target of the hacks, however, the technology team managed to secure DAO token funds in the platform, Menant also disclose the terminations of two workers, who were responsible for the breach.
Regarding REP tokens -Augur’s reputation system-, the company said that they are waiting for transfers to be enabled on the Augur network, Aurélien Menant apologized, as they promised that REP withdrawals were going to be available on may 28, which is currently impossible as Augur network hasn’t launched yet.
Asked about the re-launch of Gatecoin’s normal operations, Aurélien Menant declared:
The only objective of the Gatecoin team right now is to ensure that all of our clients can withdraw the funds they held on our exchange prior to the hot wallet breach. This means all of our efforts are focused on fund raising to redeem the stolen ETH deposits and ensuring the security of our withdrawal platform. In the meantime, our developers will work on rebuilding our platform from scratch with the intention of re-launching the exchange with new features on a ludicrously secure infrastructure.
You can check Gatecoin’s subreddit, and twitter to follow any developments in the case.
Disclaimer: the author had DAO tokens trapped in the platform, he managed to successfully withdraw the funds with Gatecoin’s temporary platform.
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