Following the $40 million Binance hack on May 7, Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao shared a very personal outlay of the day’s events and weeks following in a Binance blog post published on May 19.
CZ remained very transparent and open with the entire security incident, and continues to be transparent with his final and personal recap on the matter.
Per the blog post, CZ lays out exactly how the hack went down, including his reactions during each stage of his learning of the hack. He recaps each and every question that ran through his mind and even shares his initial reaction to learning that the exchange had been hacked.
CZ Experienced a Major State of Panic
As stated by CZ, his initial reaction was:
“I am not gonna deny it. My first reaction was: “F***!”, the second and third reactions were also the same. A few moments after that, I began to come to terms with it.”
After about 10 seconds of CZ’s “F***, F***, F***!” state, he says he started to get to work. CZ checked in with his team and says they were already a couple of steps ahead of him, in complete “War-Mode.”
He relates that the energy was good and they were all hard at work, which allowed CZ to check in with the cryptocurrency community and announce the hack, as well as do a live AMA despite having been up all night.
The Hack Was a Blessing in Disguise
According to CZ, while the days and weeks following the hack were very stressful, he now admits it was a blessing in disguise. The exchange’s security is now better than ever before, and he and his team have learned a lot and gained a lot of crucial experience because of the hack.
Ultimately, he says, Binance has become stronger because of the hack, not the other way around.
Do you think Binance and CZ did a good job with handling the hack? Let us know what you think in the comment section below.
