Cryptocurrency exchange Binance temporarily suspended its blockchain network after hackers made off with around $570 million worth of its BNB token.
Binance said late Thursday a cross-chain bridge linking with its BNB Chain was targeted, enabling hackers to move BNB tokens off the network. So-called cross-chain bridges are tools that allow the transfer of tokens from one blockchain to another.
The company said it had worked with network validators — entities or individuals who confirm transactions on the blockchain — to pause creation of new blocks on BSC, suspending all transaction processing while a team of developers investigates the breach.
Binance is the world’s largest crypto exchange by trading volume.
“An exploit on a cross-chain bridge, BSC Token Hub, resulted in extra BNB. We have asked all validators to temporarily suspend BSC,” Changpeng Zhao, Binance’s CEO, said in a tweet Thursday evening.
“The issue is contained now. Your funds are safe. We apologize for the inconvenience and will provide further updates accordingly.”
BNB Chain has since resumed operations.
In total, hackers drained 2 million BNB tokens — about $570 million at current prices — from the network, Binance’s BNB Chain said in a blog post on Friday.
The hack was caused by a bug in the bridge’s smart contract that allowed hackers to forge transactions and send money back to their crypto wallet, according to crypto security firm Immunefi. Smart contracts are pieces of code on the blockchain that allow agreements to execute automatically without human intervention.
“As with many bridge designs, there is one central point that holds most of the funds that are moving through the bridge,” Adrian Hetman, tech lead of the triaging team at Immunefi, told CNBC.
“Ultimately, the Bridge was tricked into giving funds from that contract.”
The value of BNB sank more than 3% Friday morning to $285.36 a coin, according to CoinMarketCap data.
An earlier estimate from the company placed the total amount withdrawn in a range of $100 million to $110 million. The company also said it managed to freeze $7 million of funds with the help of its security partners.
A Binance spokesperson told CNBC the company coordinated with BNB Chain validators to enact an upgrade. That meant that most of the funds remained in the exploiter’s crypto wallet, while about $100 million was “unrecovered.”
BNB Chain has 26 active validators at present and 44 in total in different time zones, the spokesperson added.
BNB Chain, originally known as Binance Chain, was first developed by Binance in 2019. Like other blockchains, it features a native token, called BNB, that can be traded or used in games and other applications.
A total of around $1.4 billion has been lost to breaches on cross-chain bridges since the start of 2022, according to data from blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis.
The crypto industry has had a rough year, with roughly $2 trillion in value being erased since the peak of a blistering rally from 2020 to 2021. The implosion of $60 billion blockchain venture Terra and a worsening macroeconomic environment have severely impacted market sentiment.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a ceremony to posthumously award the Medal of Freedom to Charlie Kirk, in the Rose Garden patio at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., Oct. 14, 2025.
Kevin Lamarque | Reuters
U.S. stocks had a rocky day of trading, swinging from highs and lows like the quality of Game of Thrones across its eight seasons.
At its lowest during the session, the S&P 500 fell as much as 1.5%, but picked up and traded positive for most of the day after U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer gave an indication that China’s next trade move could influence the implementation of President Donald Trump’s tariffs.
The optimism in markets fizzled, however, when Trump said he was considering “terminating business with China having to do with Cooking Oil” and other forms of “retribution” because the country has stopped buying U.S. soybeans since May. Investors seemed to take that threat seriously, sending the S&P 500 down 0.2% for the day.
Developments elsewhere, however, were more positive. U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell suggested that the central bank might stop tightening monetary policy with regard to its bond holdings. Furthermore, big banks — bellwethers for economic activity — such as JPMorgan Chase, Citi and Goldman Sachs, beat earnings expectations, suggesting that fundamentals are still sound.
And while Oracle’s turn to AMD’s artificial intelligence chips — hence diversifying from Nvidia graphics processing units — might not be pleasant news for Jensen Huang, spreading out concentration risk could be a positive outcome for investors banking on AI to continue the market rally.
The question, then, is whether Trump will raze the AI-supported market with his tariffs — or if the Magnificent Seven kingdom will stand.
Powell suggests the Fed might stop tightening policy. The U.S. central bank could cease reducing the size of its bond holdings, which would allow liquidity to be maintained in the economy, Powell said in a prepared speech Tuesday.
Oracle to deploy AMD artificial intelligence chips. Oracle will use 50,000 of AMD’s Instinct MI450 chips beginning in the second half of 2026, in a sign that companies are turning to Nvidia’s competitors for their processing needs.
U.S. stocks were mixed. On Tuesday, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite fell but recovered from session lows. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, however, closed in the green. The pan-European Stoxx 600 index dropped 0.37% and touched two-week lows in the session.
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U.S. President Donald Trump gestures as he poses next to a sign before a family photo at a world leaders’ summit on ending the Gaza war, amid a U.S.-brokered prisoner-hostage swap and ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas, in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, Oct. 13, 2025.
While most agree that U.S. President Donald Trump deserves credit for helping to bring an immediate end to the devastating war between Israel and Hamas, achieving a long-lasting peace is a different matter. Analysts note that detail is scant in Trump’s 20-point peace plan, meaning there are a number of grey areas and room for discontent and disagreement in the near and long-term.
This is particularly salient when it comes to both immediate matters in the peace proposal, such as the demilitarization of Hamas and withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gazan territory it currently controls, to perhaps the biggest bone of contention: a two-state solution for the Israelis and Palestinians.
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi speaks during a roundtable on “Antifa,” an anti-fascist movement he designated a domestic “terrorist organization” via executive order on September 22, at the White House in Washington, D.C., Oct. 8, 2025.
Evelyn Hockstein | Reuters
Meta removed a Facebook group page on Tuesday that was allegedly used to “dox and target” U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Chicago after being contacted by the Department of Justice.
Attorney General Pam Bondi revealed the Facebook takedown in an X post, and said that the DOJ “will continue engaging tech companies to eliminate platforms where radicals can incite imminent violence against federal law enforcement.”
A Meta spokesperson confirmed that the tech giant removed the Facebook group page, but declined to comment about its size and the specific details that warranted its removal.
“This Group was removed for violating our policies against coordinated harm,” the Meta spokesperson said in a statement that also referred to the company’s policies pertaining to “Coordinating Harm and Promoting Crime.”
Meta’s removal of the Facebook group page follows similar moves from rivals like Apple and Google, which have recently removed apps that could be used to anonymously report sightings of ICE agents and other law enforcement.
Read more CNBC tech news
Apple took down the ICEBlock app nearly two weeks ago following pressure from Bondi, who said at the time that the app was “designed to put ICE agents at risk just for doing their jobs.”
Apple said at the time in a statement that it removed the ICEBlock app based on information provided by law enforcement about alleged “safety risks.”
Google, which did not maintain the ICEBlock app on its app store, said in October that while the DOJ never contacted the search giant, the company removed “similar apps for violations of our policies.”
ICEBlock creator Joshua Aaron criticized both Apple and the White House in an interview with CNBC, and compared his app to others like Waze, which let drivers report when they see law enforcement officers in order to avoid getting ticketed for speeding.
“This is about our fundamental constitutional rights in this country being stripped away by this administration, and the powers that be who are capitulating to their requests,” Aaron said.
OpenAI’s EMEA startups head Laura Modiano spoke at the Sifted Summit on Wednesday, 8 October.
Nurphoto | Nurphoto | Getty Images
OpenAI on Tuesday announced a council of eight experts who will advise the company and provide insight into how artificial intelligence could affect users’ mental health, emotions and motivation.
The group, which is called the Expert Council on Well-Being and AI, will initially guide OpenAI’s work on its chatbot ChatGPT and its short-form video app Sora, the company said. Through check-ins and recurring meetings, OpenAI said the council will help it define what healthy AI interactions look like.
OpenAI has been expanding its safety controls in recent months as the company has faced mounting scrutiny over how it protects users, particularly minors.
In September, the Federal Trade Commission launched an inquiry into several tech companies, including OpenAI, over how chatbots like ChatGPT could negatively affect children and teenagers. OpenAI is also embroiled in a wrongful death lawsuit from a family who blames ChatGPT for their teenage son’s death by suicide.
Read more CNBC tech news
The company is building an age prediction system that will automatically apply teen-appropriate settings for users under 18, and it launched a series of parental controls late last month. Parents can now get notified if their child is showing signs of acute distress, for instance.
OpenAI said it began informally consulting with members of its new expert council as it was building its parental controls. The company brought on additional experts in psychiatry. psychology and human-computer interaction as it formalized the council, which officially launched with an in-person session last week.
In addition to its expert council, OpenAI said it is also working with researchers and mental health clinicians within the Global Physician Network who will help test ChatGPT and establish company policies.
Here are the members of OpenAI’s Expert Council on Well-Being and AI:
Andrew Przybylski, a professor of human behavior and technology at the University of Oxford.
David Bickham, a research scientist in the Digital Wellness Lab at Boston Children’s Hospital.
David Mohr, the director of Northwestern University’s Center for Behavioral Intervention Technologies.
Mathilde Cerioli, the chief scientist at Everyone.AI, a nonprofit that explores the risks and benefits of AI for children.
Munmun De Choudhury, a professor at Georgia Tech’s School of Interactive Computing.
Dr. Robert Ross, a pediatrician by training and the former CEO of The California Endowment, a nonprofit that aims to expand access to affordable health care.
Dr. Sara Johansen, a clinical assistant professor at Stanford University who founded its Digital Mental Health Clinic.
Tracy Dennis-Tiwary, a professor of psychology at Hunter College.
If you are having suicidal thoughts or are in distress, contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 for support and assistance from a trained counselor