Circle and Tether blacklisted a wallet address linked to the Bitget breach, freezing 218,023 USDT and 99,990 USDC worth roughly $318,000 combined. Circle executed the freeze at 05:00 UTC on September 25, with Tether following suit on the same address labeled "Bitget Exploiter 8."
The frozen stablecoins represent a small fraction of the total assets stolen from the exchange. According to MistTrack, attacker-controlled addresses hold more than 63,000 ETH, which stablecoin issuers cannot intercept since Ethereum exists on a public blockchain without a freeze mechanism comparable to centralized stablecoin rails.
Circle and Tether maintain blacklist capabilities that allow them to freeze USDC and USDT held in flagged addresses, a power both issuers have deployed against sanctioned parties and theft proceeds since at least 2022. The mechanism works by blocking the frozen tokens from transfer or redemption at Circle's and Tether's contracts, rendering the stablecoins inert to the attacker even if they retain private keys.
The Bitget incident, disclosed in mid-September, resulted in the loss of approximately $351 million in cryptocurrency and fiat across customer wallets and company reserves. The breach exposed a vulnerability in Bitget's key management system, allowing attackers to withdraw assets without triggering standard security protocols.
MistTrack's tracking data shows attackers dispersed stolen funds across multiple addresses and bridged assets to different blockchains. Stablecoin freezes target only USDT and USDC in transit or held on Ethereum and other compatible chains, leaving attackers with access to the bulk of their haul in non-frozen tokens and native cryptocurrencies like ETH.
The $318,000 freeze is one of several coordinated responses to the breach. Earlier on-chain analysis by security firms identified attacker wallets before the stablecoin issuers acted, giving Bitget and law enforcement a window to track movement patterns and coordinate intervention.
The frozen amount equals 0.09 percent of the reported total theft. Tether and Circle have frozen stablecoins tied to past exchange hacks including Poly Network and Ronin, though the majority of those losses also went unrecovered.
