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The Bank of Korea (BOK) has urged South Korea’s cryptocurrency industry to adopt stronger safeguards after a major operational failure at crypto exchange Bithumb earlier this year.
In comments made on Monday, the central bank said crypto exchanges should use new mechanisms intended to prevent mistakes like the one that led to an erroneous payment involving 620,000 Bitcoin (BTC) in February.
Local media reports said the BOK pointed to the lack of circuit-breaker style systems as a key reason such incidents can escalate. The central bank also noted that, compared with traditional finance, the crypto asset sector generally has “weaker internal controls and lower regulatory standards.”
According to the BOK’s description at the time, the Bithumb incident involved staff distributing Bitcoin without the required approvals. The exchange allegedly allowed employees to send BTC without supervisor clearance and without verification through internal monitoring departments.
The BOK added that the damage was worsened by delays in recognizing what had happened and responding appropriately. It said Bithumb’s fraud detection system did not function as expected, contributing to the scale and impact of the mistake.
Looking ahead, the Bank of Korea said it believes crypto exchanges should consider system-level protections similar to the Korea Exchange (KRX) circuit breakers.
The BOK said the goal is to provide markets with an automatic “pause” mechanism during abnormal activity—such as large-volume orders or sudden, sharp price swings—so trading can be halted when conditions indicate something is going wrong.
Beyond trading halts, the central bank stressed the need for better technology to reduce human error. It said exchanges should have IT systems that can automatically and in real time verify that internal ledgers match blockchain balances, and stop erroneous payments before they propagate.
In its remarks, the BOK emphasized real-time checks to confirm balances accurately and prevent operational mistakes from turning into costly incidents.

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