The Poly Network protocol exploit is the largest executed in DeFi history so far, with more than $610 million in losses.
The developers of the decentralized finance protocol (DeFi) poly network They reported via Twitter about an exploit carried out yesterday in the protocol code, which resulted in several hundred million dollars in losses. According to the report, the hacker managed to access funds deposited within the protocol, transferring value of more than $610 million in Binance USD (BUSD), Wrapped Bitcoin (wBTC), Wrapped Ethereum (wETH), and Binance Coin (BNB) tokens. . The funds were being exchanged for other tokens on the Ethereum, BSC and Polygon networks, and by stablecoins such as Tether (USDT) and USD Coin (USDC).
Poly Network is calling on miners and exchange platforms cryptocurrencies, to block the addresses to which the hacker sent the funds, in order to prevent them from exchanging and spending them. Several have already responded to this call. exchanges, such as Curve Finance, which rejected one of the transactions of the hacker who tried to move the funds after the Poly Network developers announced the exploit; even Tether Limited, the company responsible for issuing the stablecoin USDT reported which has already blocked a hacker address with nearly $33 million in funds extracted during the exploit.
Developers explain that the exploit was executed taking advantage of a vulnerability present in contract calls, although there is no official report yet.
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The biggest exploit in history
The Poly Network exploit is the largest hack executed in the history of DeFi, carried out almost simultaneously on the Ethereum blockchain networks, BSC, and on Ethereum's second-layer scalability solution, Polygon.
To date, the BSC shows that about 100 million of the $253 million that were extracted in tokens from the network were moved into one of the contracts of the Ellipsis Finance protocol, developed on the BSC. The hacker is moving funds through BSC, Ethereum and Polygon, after an unknown user warned him that Tether is blocking USDT transactions. The user received $42.000 from the hacker for the information, notes The Block.
This fact drove the user community crazy, who are flocking to the hacker asking to share the loot.
A cry for help
Several desperate users, or perhaps many who want to take advantage of the situation in an easy way, are sending messages to the hacker with a “cry” for help. As shown data From Etherscan, several cryptocurrency users are messaging the hacker, publicly sharing their Ethereum and BSC addresses, in the hope that the person responsible for the Poly Network exploit is some kind of modern-day “Robin Hood” and sends some of the stolen funds as charity or “social help.”
However, it is worth clarifying that the hacker's actions not only affected investors with large portfolios, but also retail investors who placed their trust and funds in the DeFi protocol to generate returns. The messages sent by the majority of users, as a CoinDesk analyst points out, reveal that the community is “getting used” to the constant hacks that occur in DeFi, that instead of condemning the attacker's dishonest action, they are celebrating it.
The identity of the hacker was discovered
The Poly Network developers assured that they will begin legal action against the protocol hacker, whose actions are leaving tens of thousands of users affected. However, within a few hours, the protocol developers sent a letter to the person responsible for the exploit asking for the return of the stolen funds.
Blockchain company SlowMist published a report pointing out that the identity of the hacker has already been discovered. According to the firm, the IP address of the device from which the attack was executed is known, as well as the hacker's email and his digital identity, although it did not provide further details in this regard.
For his part, Changpeng Zhao, CEO of Binance, stated on Twitter that he was aware of the Poly Network exploit, and although he indicated that he cannot control the transactions that occur within the network, he assured that he is working with the Poly Network team. platform security and other partners to do everything possible and stop the exchange of the funds.
DeFi in the crosshairs of hackers
This year, hacks and exploits to DeFi protocols, both on Ethereum and other blockchains, have intensified in such a way that the losses within this financial ecosystem so far this year already exceed the losses seen throughout 2020.10 By April 30 of this year, losses in DeFi, due to hacks and exploits, exceeded 386 million, as Bit2Me News reported at the time; Although, since then, at least a dozen more attacks have occurred within this financial ecosystem.
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