Jinse Caijing reports that the Bitcoin cold wallet for cryptocurrency exchange OKEx is a single-signature; Xu Mingxing holds the private key.
This is problematic for OKEx users, for Xu was apparently “taken away by police” in China several weeks ago. Because of this, OKEx stated that it had stopped the withdrawals, which sustained to be inaccessible.
As of now, the company elaborated,
“One of our private key holders [presumably Xu] is currently cooperating with a public security bureau in investigations where required. We have been out of touch with the concerned private key holder. As such, the associated authorization could not be completed.”
Assuming that Jinse Caijing’s report is accurate, Xu either holds the only key for the exchange’s Bitcoin wallet or the exchange shares one private key among its staff instead of using a multi-signature wallet or other solution.
However, it is equivalent to sharing your Netflix password with more at stake than someone seeing your browser history. Glassnode estimated that OKEx is holding 200,000 Bitcoin in its vaults.
Xu had been linked to a money-laundering investigation. However, OKEx has denied that his visit with the police was connected to that. In 2018, Xu tackled fraud allegations but wasn’t charged.
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