China just accused the US of conducting a state level hack to steal 13 billion in Bitcoin - this is wild

Chinas National Computer Virus Emergency Response Center dropped a bombshell report accusing the US government of stealing 127k Bitcoin worth around 13 billion dollars. This is getting geopolitical fast.

The Bitcoin was originally stolen from Chinas LuBian mining pool back in December 2020. At the time it was worth about 3.5 billion but the hack did not get much mainstream attention. The coins then sat in the attacker’s wallets for years and only started moving in mid 2024 before ending up in addresses that analysts and China’s report now link to US authorities, and that the DOJ says it controls as of the seizure announced in October 2025.

Chinas argument is that normal criminals would cash out immediately. The fact these coins stayed dormant for about four years points to a state level operation not some random hacker looking for quick profit. They say the sophistication of the hack and the long dormancy proves it was government orchestrated.

The US Department of Justice seized the Bitcoin in October 2025 as part of a case against Chen Zhi who ran Cambodias Prince Group. They charged him with running a massive crypto fraud and forced labor scam network and said the seizure was a lawful criminal proceeds forfeiture. The DOJ has explicitly denied China’s “state level hack” accusation and says it had no involvement in the original theft.

Heres the thing tho. Chen Zhi apparently sent multiple messages on chain basically begging the hackers to return the Bitcoin and offering ransom. The hackers never responded which is weird if they were just criminals.

This batch of Bitcoin now represents about 39% of all BTC held by the US government based on on chain tracking of US controlled addresses. Trump recently said the US is far ahead of China in crypto adoption so this accusation comes at a politically charged moment.

Whether China has real evidence or this is just geopolitical posturing nobody knows yet. But it could spark what some analysts are already calling a crypto cold war between the two superpowers.