b14g Says 97 Million CORE Drained, Pauses Contracts

Bitcoin staking protocol b14g said it paused affected contracts after approximately 97 million CORE was withdrawn without authorization at 5:29 a.m. ET on Oct. 31.

The reported withdrawal was worth about $1.36 million using CoinGecko's price of $0.0140 at 12:38 p.m. ET. The token count represents roughly 6.5% of CORE's 1.50 billion circulating supply, according to The Defiant's calculations. CoinGecko put CORE's circulating market capitalization at about $21.1 million.

b14g lets $BTC and CORE holders pair their stakes to earn boosted rewards on the Core blockchain. Its documentation describes separate custody arrangements: $BTC stays time-locked on Bitcoin rather than moving to Core.

The incident affected CORE staked through b14g, the protocol said. “$BTC staked through b14g remains time-locked on Bitcoin and was not affected,” it wrote.

The announcement did not specify whether any CORE withdrawal routes remain available during the pause. $BTC staked to Core, meanwhile, is locked until its Bitcoin timelock expires, according to b14g's documentation.

Tracing the CORE

b14g said approximately 68 million CORE remained on Core and exchange partners had frozen about 9 million CORE linked to the attacker. It said it was working with the Core team, security partners and exchanges to trace funds and coordinate freezing and recovery efforts.

Core's block explorer records show a transfer of about 73.65 million CORE between the two addresses b14g identified as attacker-controlled. When checked, the receiving address displayed a balance of about 63.65 million CORE, while the sender held less than one CORE.

b14g said it would publish a post-mortem covering the technical cause, impact and next steps for affected users.