The Ledger case: what happened, with sources.
An implant with an eSIM reads the 24 words from the screen bus during setup and sends them over the mobile network. The Secure Element is untouched, so Genuine Check passes. Ledger confirmed it on Oct 13, 2026.
Timeline
Oct 10, 2026
Two tampered units analysed
Tibane Labs analyses two Ledger units bought on Yahoo! Auctions Japan and Amazon Japan (shipped from Malaysia).
ForkLog · Oct 10, 2026
Oct 10–13, 2026
Losses estimated at $71.5M–$103.4M
Five independent estimates. Ledger has not confirmed any figure.
Arkham, Specter, Galaxy, Bitquery, YFarmX · Oct 10–13, 2026
Oct 13, 2026
Ledger confirms the LTE implant
An implant with an eSIM reads the 24 words from the screen bus during setup and sends them over the mobile network. It does not touch the Secure Element, so Genuine Check passes. MediaMarkt suspends Ledger sales in Europe.
The Block · Oct 13, 2026
Oct 13, 2026
Ledger’s CTO asks for inspection providers
Trezor removes CryptoBilis as a reseller; OneKey offers replacements.
Crypto Times · CoinCentral · Ledger CTO on X · Oct 13–14, 2026
Oct 14, 2026
Ledger asks to pull product in 7 Asian markets
Crypto Times dates it Oct 14; CoinCentral dates it Oct 13. Front page of Hacker News the same day.
Crypto Times · CoinCentral · Oct 13–14, 2026
Oct 14, 2026
People open their Ledgers on X
“I tried to see if my Ledger was tampered with”: 501K views. A how-to-open thread per model: 1.93M views.
X (@0xJohannes_, @isabellasg3, @MagicalTux) · Oct 14, 2026 09:45 UTC