Security experts from SlowMist said the stolen cryptocurrency was transferred to three different addresses.
Over $600 million has been stolen in what is likely the largest cryptocurrency theft in the history.
Hackers took advantage of a vulnerability in Poly Network, a platform that aims to connect various blockchains enabling them to work together.
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Poly Network announced the attack on Twitter, urging the hackers to “return the hacked assets.”
— Poly Network (@PolyNetwork2) August 10, 2021
A blockchain is a public ledger of transactions used by cryptocurrencies. Each digital coin has its own blockchain, which is unique. Poly Network claims to be able to connect these blockchains.
Poly Network is a decentralized platform for finance. DeFi is an umbrella term that refers to financial applications built on blockchain technology that aim to eliminate intermediaries such as brokers and exchanges. As a result, it is referred to as decentralised.
Proponents argue that this can improve the efficiency and cost of financial applications such as lending and borrowing.
“The amount of money you hacked is the biggest in defi history,” Poly Network said in another tweet.
After stealing the funds, the hackers began sending them to several other cryptocurrency addresses. SlowMist researchers reported that a total of more than $610 million in cryptocurrency was transferred to three distinct addresses.
Poly Network requested cryptocurrency exchanges to “blacklist tokens” originating from the hackers’ addresses.
According to the stablecoin’s issuer, approximately $33 million in Tether has been frozen as a result of the theft.
. @Tether_to just froze ~33M $USDt on 0xC8a65Fadf0e0dDAf421F28FEAb69Bf6E2E589963 as part of the #PolyNetwork hack https://t.co/EviPTAkQJD
— Paolo Ardoino (@paoloardoino) August 10, 2021
Meanwhile, Changpeng Zhao, the CEO of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, stated that he was aware of the attack.
He said Binance is “coordinating with all our security partners to proactively help,” but that “there are no guarantees.”
Binance is “coordinating with all our security partners to provide proactively help,” he said, but “there are no guarantees.”
We are aware of the https://t.co/IgGJ0598Q0 exploit that occurred today. While no one controls BSC (or ETH), we are coordinating with all our security partners to proactively help. There are no guarantees. We will do as much as we can. Stay #SAFU. ???? https://t.co/TG0dKPapQT
— CZ ???? Binance (@cz_binance) August 10, 2021
“We will take legal actions and we urge the hackers to return the assets,” Poly Network said on Twitter.
SlowMist said in a tweet that their researchers had “grasped the attacker’s mailbox, IP, and device fingerprints” and are “tracking possible identity clues related to the Poly Network attacker.”
According to experts, theft was “likely to be a long-planned, organized and prepared attack.”
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According to cryptocurrency compliance company CipherTrace, DeFi-related hacks totaled $361 million from January to July. DeFi fraud is also rising. They accounted for 54% of total crypto fraud volume in the first seven months of the year versus 3% last year.
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