Bitcoin Falls 4%... Russian Hackers Demand $10 Million Ransom in Bitcoin

[Asia Economy New York=Correspondent Baek Jong-min] On the last day of the US Independence Day holiday, most cryptocurrency prices are falling. Russian hackers are reportedly demanding $70 million worth of Bitcoin as ransom from companies affected by ransomware.

[Image source=Reuters Yonhap News]

As of 4:45 PM local time on the 5th, according to CoinMarketCap, the price of Bitcoin has dropped 4.6% compared to 24 hours ago, trading in the $33,800 range.

Ethereum is down 5.6% to the $2,210 range, and Dogecoin has fallen 6.2%, trading around 23 cents.

Cryptocurrencies have recently shown a tendency to decline over weekends, but this weekend saw a rise before turning downward on this day.

The strong performance last weekend is understood to be influenced by the recovery in profitability for mining companies due to a decrease in the hash rate, which indicates Bitcoin mining difficulty, caused by China's mining regulations.

On this day, reports emerged that the Russian ransomware hacking group REvil Strikes is demanding $70 million in Bitcoin as ransom from US companies.

US information technology and security management service provider Kaseya was hit by a ransomware attack over the past weekend, reportedly affecting about 1,000 companies.

REvil previously received $5 million in Bitcoin ransom through a ransomware attack on the US pipeline company Colonial Pipeline.

The world's largest meat company, JBS Holdings, also suffered the same hacking attack and paid $11 million in ransom.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.