MediaMarktSaturn Pulls Ledger Products Amid Tampering Reports
European electronics retailer MediaMarkt has pulled Ledger hardware wallets from its shelves as investigations into physical tampering expand.
MediaMarktSaturn Pulls Ledger Products Amid Tampering Reports
European electronics retailer MediaMarkt has pulled Ledger hardware wallets from its shelves as investigations into physical tampering expand.
Retailer Withdraws Ledger Hardware Wallet Security Stock
European retailer MediaMarkt has pulled Ledger products from its inventory as the hardware wallet manufacturer probes tampering reports expanding beyond Southeast Asia. According to CoinDesk, covert hardware was implanted in some Ledger crypto wallet devices sold by Southeast Asian reseller CryptoBilis, reading users recovery phrases and transmitting them over a mobile phone network.
Ledger stated that the spy chip sat inside the device enclosure. When a user set up the signer and the screen displayed the recovery phrase, the implants microcontroller recognized and decoded the words before transmitting them over LTE using an eSIM.
Investigation Into Supply Chain Attack Continues
The incident represents a physical supply chain attack rather than a breach of Ledger software or internal systems. Ledger confirmed that the implant did not modify the devices secure element, operating system, or alter transactions and signatures.
While Ledger has not confirmed the total number of victims or stolen values, onchain researchers estimated losses reaching up to $93.2 million across more than 300 wallets. Tether subsequently froze $10 million of its dollar-pegged stablecoin USDT tied to the theft, as reported by CoinDesk.
Guidance for Affected Customers
CryptoBilis has stopped selling Ledger signers according to Ledger updates. The Paris-based company advised customers who purchased devices from the reseller not to initialize them.
Users who have already initialized a compromised device are strongly urged to move their assets to a new device featuring a newly generated recovery phrase.
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