Binance co-founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao pushed back at Elon Musk on Friday, October 30, after the X owner reacted to one of Zhao’s cybersecurity warnings with fire and laughing emojis during the fallout from a multibillion-dollar hack at the exchange.
Musk had replied to Zhao’s X account with “🔥😂” beneath an October 28 warning against clicking email links or opening attachments, even those sent by familiar contacts. The response appeared to mock the timing of that advice following the Binance security breach. Musk offered no technical explanation in the emoji post.
Zhao responded several hours later: “Elon, have a lot of respect for you, but bad time to troll. Please stop.” He then invoked Binance’s reported $500 million investment in Musk’s acquisition of Twitter, saying the associated SPCX shares were now worth more than $1 billion and asking Musk to show support.
The reported value of those holdings is Zhao’s own assertion; the post did not provide an independently audited valuation. His public response was a request for solidarity during a security emergency, not an accusation that Musk participated in the attack.
Binance Says About $3 Billion Has Been Frozen
In its October 30 incident update, Binance estimated the total affected assets at approximately $6.3 billion, of which around $3 billion had been frozen on-chain. The company said its early investigation pointed to a compromised DevOps engineer’s laptop potentially allowing unauthorized withdrawals through a service container. It reported no evidence of leaked wallet private keys, but said a full technical post-mortem was still pending.
Binance pledged to cover losses from its SAFU protection fund and corporate resources. It temporarily suspended deposits and withdrawals during security checks, while separate updates said deposits had resumed but withdrawal restrictions remained. The company’s promises are not an independent determination of every customer’s eventual recovery.
Zhao had earlier said user funds would be covered despite no longer managing Binance. His exchange with Musk underscores the tension between social-media jokes and a developing financial-security crisis. Neither a phishing warning nor Musk’s reaction establishes the exploit’s root cause; investigators must determine that from access logs, wallet activity and the completed forensic review.
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