Coinbase CEO Says Company Won’t Pay Hackers’ Ransom

The CEO of Coinbase, Brian Armstrong, said in a social media post on Thursday that a rescue note arrived by email asking for $ 20 million in Bitcoin in exchange for not releasing information that the computer pirates had obtained in Coinbase customers.

“I’m going to answer publicly,” said Armstrong. “We are not going to pay the ransom.”

https://t.co/evpibmfvrw pic.twitter.com/f6updkl5R0

– Brian Armstrong (@Brian_armstrong) May 15, 2025

Armstrong said the attackers had found a customer service agent of “weak link” outside the United States that accepted a “bribe” and gave personal data about customers.

In a company’s blog post, Coinbase said it will reimburse customers cheated to send funds to the attacker. The hackers received access to names, addresses, telephone numbers and emails; Masked social security numbers (last four digits); Masked bank account numbers; And images of the government -id (driving licenses, passports). No private passwords or keys were obtained, says the company. The email arrived on Sunday.

Related: Do you think you can hack Apple’s intelligence servers? Apple is paying up to $ 1 million if you can.

“(The stolen data) allow them to carry out social engineering attacks where they call our clients who go through the scope of the Coinbase client and try to deceive them to send their funds to the attackers,” said Armstrong.

According to the AP, Coinbase estimated at a presentation before the SEC that could end up spending anywhere $ 180 million and $ 400 million “related to remediation costs and voluntary reimbursements related to this incident.”

Meanwhile, the New York Times It informs that the SEC is investigating Coinbase on whether or not it reported IPO duration in 2021. The company claimed to have more than 100 million “verified users” in marketing materials.

Coinbase’s shares fell 7% on Thursday after the news, by Yahoo.

Related: Around 10 billion passwords have been exposed in the largest password hack in history