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Hackers steal $600m of crypto assets from Poly Network

By Aaron Woolner

00:57, 11 August 2021

Credit : Shutterstock

Poly Network, a decentralised finance (defi) outfit which processes transactions for various digital platforms, lost about $600m in crypto assets after it was hacked.

The Chinese firm tweeted that the heist was the biggest in defi history and it asked the hackers to contact it so they could, “work out a solution”. 

“Law enforcement will regard this as a major crime and you will be pursued. It is very unwise for you to do any further transactions. The money you stole is from tens of thousands of crypto community members, hence the people,” the company tweeted. 

Multiple currency types stolen

The hackers got away with a variety of digital currencies: roughly $267m of Ether, $252m of Binance coins and about $85m USDC tokens were stolen. According to Bitcoin.com, tokens from more than 10 different digital currencies were stolen. 

Defi uses blockchain technology to conduct financial transactions without using intermediaries. This happens in a variety of ways, in Poly Network’s case it allows users to exchange different types of digital currencies. 

Poly Network has so far enabled transactions using nine different tokens: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Neo, Ontology, Elrond, Ziliqa, Binance Smart Chain, Switcheo and Huobi ECO Chain. 

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BTC/USD

98,698.05 Price
+0.750% 1D Chg, %
Long position overnight fee -0.0616%
Short position overnight fee 0.0137%
Overnight fee time 22:00 (UTC)
Spread 106.00

XRP/USD

1.40 Price
+16.340% 1D Chg, %
Long position overnight fee -0.0616%
Short position overnight fee 0.0137%
Overnight fee time 22:00 (UTC)
Spread 0.01168

ADA/USD

0.87 Price
+7.010% 1D Chg, %
Long position overnight fee -0.0616%
Short position overnight fee 0.0137%
Overnight fee time 22:00 (UTC)
Spread 0.00646

ETH/USD

3,365.09 Price
+0.540% 1D Chg, %
Long position overnight fee -0.0616%
Short position overnight fee 0.0137%
Overnight fee time 22:00 (UTC)
Spread 6.00

Tokens "blacklisted"

Poly Network said that the breach came after its systems were hacked.

"After preliminary investigation, we located the cause of the vulnerability. The hacker exploited a vulnerability between contract calls, the exploit was not caused by the single keeper as rumoured," it tweeted.

Poly Network published the addresses where the funds were transferred and called on miners of affected blockchains and crypto exchanges to “blacklist” these tokens.

Defi crime at "all time high"

The sum stolen makes it one of the biggest crypto heists in history, alongside Coincheck and Mt Gox.

Defi crime has hit an “all time high” in the first seven months of 2021, according to research from crypto research firm, CipherTrace. While broader crypto crime has fallen, Defi firms lost $474 million between January to July, according to the research report. 

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