14 May 2012
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Bitcoinica site hacked!
During an attack on the Bitcoinica exchange, hackers managed to steal 18,547 BTC – valued at approximately US$100,000. The operators have taken their site offline for the time being. Bitcoinica says that no bitcoins were stolen from users during the incident; apparently, the intruders only accessed the organisation's accounts.
Exchanges like Bitcoinica are a great resource allowing people to easily purchase BTC with normal currency, but to use the exchange as if it were a bank defeats the purpose of the decentralised structure of the Bitcoin system. You should always transfer your Bitcoins to your own personal wallet so that it is under you own control. If everybody looked after their own Bitcoins then there wouldn't be huge repositories that become attractive proposition for cyber-criminals.
See also:
- Bitcoin - our local bitcoin article
