"Bithumb, one of South Korea's largest cryptocurrency exchanges, ran a regular promotional campaign in early February 2026. However, it turned into a major regulatory concern. What started as a simple internal data-entry mistake briefly displayed hundreds of thousands of "ghost Bitcoin" on user dashboards. Some account holders actually traded those balances, prompting regulators to examine the inner mechanisms of centralized crypto platforms more closely."
"From a modest promotion to a serious error Bithumb intended to offer a small reward program, crediting users with a modest amount of Korean won, typically 2,000 won ($1.37) per person. Reward programs are a standard tactic to boost user activity. Instead, an input mistake caused the system to credit Bitcoin ( BTC) rather than fiat. For about 20 minutes, the exchange's internal ledger reflected roughly 620,000 BTC across hundreds of accounts."
Bithumb ran a promotional campaign that accidentally credited users with Bitcoin instead of Korean won, creating roughly 620,000 BTC in ghost balances across hundreds of accounts for about 20 minutes. During that window, roughly 1,788 BTC worth of trades were executed before the exchange locked trading. A simple data-entry error and a system design where trades update a private ledger before onchain settlement allowed phantom balances to be tradable. Regulatory filings showed Bithumb held only 175 BTC of its own while holding custody of over 42,000 BTC for customers. South Korea's Financial Supervisory Service probed why faulty internal data became executable trades, prompting calls for bank-like supervision and stronger tradability controls.
Read at Cointelegraph
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