The post Circle Justifies USDC Freeze Authority Amid $270M Drift Hack appeared on BitcoinEthereumNews.com.

In view of rising criticism after Drift Protocol’s $270 million exploit, Circle Internet Financial has released a detailed policy statement. The statement came in response to questions and criticism about the company’s ability to freeze $USDC that was based on legal or demand reasons as opposed to arbitrary decision making. Circle says in its official blog post that the company’s power to freeze funds is exercised legally and not as an emotional or knee-jerk reaction. The company stresses that the ability is “not a backdoor” and does not represent any sort of surveillance by algorithm. This clarification comes at a critical time for the digital asset ecosystem, where conversations regarding decentralization, regulatory compliance and user protection are becoming more pressing in the wake of major security breaches. Recent events are a reminder that trust in digital assets depends on security, accountability, and the rule of law across the ecosystem. Circle is a regulated company that complies with sanctions, law enforcement orders, and court-mandated requirements. We freeze assets when… pic.twitter.com/zG0FZzCd1n — Circle (@circle) April 10, 2026 State-Affiliated Threat Actors Linked to Drift Exploit The scale of the exploit on April 1, which resulted in losses of between $270 million and $285 million, underscores the need for Circle’s response. The attack has been linked to UNC4736, a team that allegedly has connections with North Korea and goes by aliases like AppleJeus or Citrine Sleet, according to analysis from Drift Protocol. According to reports, the attackers swapped a large part of this stolen cash into USDC and bridged some across chains using Circle’s Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol (CCTP). The transfer has landed Circle in the middle of the controversy, leading skeptics to wonder why the assets weren’t placed on ice mid-transit. Blockchain analytics platform Elliptic has also weighed in, further backing claims that the…

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Filed under: News - @ April 11, 2026 11:24 am