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Bithumb has filed for a court-approved asset freeze to recover 7 BTC, worth approximately $496,000, from users who refused to return funds two months after the exchange’s payout error.
The legal action is described as the final unresolved chapter of one of the largest accidental Bitcoin distributions in exchange history.
On February 6, a Bithumb employee running a Random Box promotional event entered the wrong currency unit. Instead of distributing 2,000 Korean won (about $1.37) to each winner, the system sent 2,000 BTC to 695 users at the same time.
Within minutes, Bithumb’s internal ledger showed 620,000 BTC credited to user accounts. The credited amounts were not real Bitcoin—only database entries—but some users sold immediately.
Bitcoin’s price on Bithumb fell 17% to $55,000 while global prices moved only slightly. Accounts were frozen within 35 minutes, and by the end of the day, 99.7% of the erroneous credits had been reversed.
In an internal email, Bithumb Exchange Business Division Vice President Hwang Seung-wook said that a single error in setting an event reward unit can destabilize an entire crypto exchange.
Recovery did not end the matter. South Korea’s Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), Financial Services Commission (FSC) and Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) launched investigations. CEO Lee Jae-won told parliament that the company was “acutely aware of the deficiency in internal system control.”
Lawmakers said regulators inspected Bithumb three times between 2022 and 2025 and missed every structural warning sign.
Three weeks ago, the FIU fined Bithumb $24.6 million for AML violations and suspended new-user registration for six months.
The incident also affected Bithumb’s growth plans: the exchange delayed its planned US IPO to 2028 as a direct result of the fallout.
The 7 BTC court filing is framed as more than a $496,000 recovery effort. It centers on whether users who kept funds despite an obvious glitch face legal consequences.
South Korea’s Supreme Court ruled in January that Bitcoin held on exchanges can be treated as property subject to seizure. The Bithumb case is presented as the first real test of that ruling.
The incident is also described as highlighting a point the industry rarely discusses openly: exchange balances are not Bitcoin itself, but entries in a private ledger.
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