Two of South Korea's leading cryptocurrency exchanges, Bithumb and Upbit, have announced temporary suspensions of deposit and withdrawal services for specific tokens to facilitate crucial network upgrades. These planned operational pauses are standard security measures to ensure user asset safety during core protocol transitions.
Bithumb will suspend all deposit and withdrawal services for the Allora (ALLO) token beginning at 8:00 a.m. UTC on February 16, 2025. The exchange stated this "essential pause" is to support a scheduled network upgrade for the Allora protocol. Importantly, trading of ALLO on Bithumb's spot markets will continue uninterrupted during the suspension. The exchange did not specify an exact end time but committed to resuming services promptly after confirming network stability post-upgrade.
Concurrently, Upbit has announced a temporary suspension of all deposit and withdrawal services for Hedera (HBAR), starting at 2:00 p.m. UTC on February 18, 2025. This action directly supports a scheduled network upgrade on the Hedera Hashgraph platform. Similar to Bithumb's procedure, trading of HBAR against Korean Won (KRW), Bitcoin (BTC), and Tether (USDT) pairs on Upbit will continue without interruption. The exchange will provide a follow-up announcement once the Hedera network upgrade concludes and stability is confirmed.
Industry analysts view these planned suspensions as a sign of operational diligence and mature risk management. "A transparent, scheduled maintenance for a network upgrade reflects positively on an exchange's risk management framework," notes a blockchain infrastructure report from the Korea Fintech Institute. Such coordination between exchanges and project teams is a global best practice, historically employed by major exchanges like Coinbase, Binance, and Kraken during upgrades for networks such as Ethereum, Solana, and Cardano.
The announcements occur within South Korea's strict regulatory environment, where exchanges operate under rigorous compliance standards set by the Financial Services Commission (FSC). These procedural halts demonstrate proactive system management aligned with regulatory expectations for security and clear user communication.
