The cryptocurrency cross-chain protocol is the latest to become a victim of a cyberattack
Decentralized cross-chain protocol Mixin Network sent a message to the hacker behind the $200 million breach on September 23, offering a $20-million bug bounty in exchange for returning the remaining funds.
The Mixin Network message was encrypted with the exploiter transaction, requesting them to return the stolen funds, which are mostly user assets. “Most of our platform assets were users, and we hope you can refund them. You can keep $20M of the assets as a BUG Bounty Reward for the BUG,” reads the message.
Mixin Network verified the hack on September 25, saying the exploiters breached a third-party cloud service provider, stealing almost $200 million in assets.
Mixin founder Feng Xiaodong said at the time that the company would reimburse those affected by the hack up to a “maximum of 50%,” with the remainder paid back in bond tokens that Mixin would then repurchase from future earnings.
Mixin hasn’t given complete details about events leading up to the exploit, but the hacker’s interactions with Mixin were highlighted on an on-chain analytic platform. The hacker’s address 0x1795 would receive five Ether from Mixin in 2022.
It still hasn’t been determined how the hackers could steal $200 million worth of assets through the data breach, as cross-chain protocols in the DeFi space have been targeted in some of the crypto industry’s biggest exploits. A report shows, over 50% of all DeFi exploits occurred on cross-chain protocols, resulting in a loss of over $2.5 billion.
Cross-chain protocols often hold many assets from various chains, making them more susceptible to these exploits.
