A large number of crypto exchange users of Binance and Huobi claim that they have recently been bombarded with calls from unknown numbers claiming to be the customer service of these crypto exchanges and inviting them to some chat groups where some unreliable exchanges and shitcoins are promoted.

Though it has turned out that these are phony calls, the source of these users’ leaked phone numbers remains a mystery. As a matter of fact, trading platforms can hardly prove themselves innocent of info leaks.

This morning, a bulk of Binance users’ know-your-customer (KYC) data have seemingly been leaked. Photos of Binance users’ KYC data have been exposed and “livestreamed” via a Telegram group called “FIND YOUR BINANCE KYC” which was created by a user going by “Guardian M”.

Screenshot of the posted KYC photos in the Telegram group (faces and key info are blurred by 8btc)

In these pictures, individuals from more than a dozen countries including China, Japan, Singapore, Pakistan and Turkey are holding up a piece of paper with the word “Binance” and the date the picture was taken at, mostly showing the date of Feb.24, 2018. Their faces and identity cards or passports are visible, which is required in KYC checks and appears to be legitimate.

The world’s leading crypto exchange quickly responded that the “KYC leak FUD” is old news, which is the same as that reported in January that hacked KYC data from Binance were for sale on a darknet market. Though nothing seemed to be leaked back then, those data ready for sale at that time is now being released to the public freely in the Telegram group.

The exchange claims that the info is not yet proven to come from Binance as the KYC data published in the Telegram group, with no watermarks, is different from those stored in their system.

yes, old news, different spin. https://t.co/2B1WdOxqdc

— CZ Binance (@cz_binance) August 7, 2019

Nevertheless, it cannot stop users from panicking, considering these “REAL people in the REAL world whose REAL WORLD personal information” are released.

At the time of writing, there have already been over 9,000 people in the telegram group, growing by thousands in minutes, and the number is still counting with more people flooding in. All the members in the group could access to these images.