Bancor, a decentralized liquidity network, announced on Monday it experienced a security breach. Although details about the breach are currently being investigated, Bancor released an update about the facts the network has so far.
According to Bancor, a wallet used to upgrade some smart contacts was compromised. This compromised wallet was then used to withdraw ETH from the BNT smart contact in the amount of 24,984 (~$12.5 million) and the same wallet was also used to steal 229,356,645 NPXS (~$1 million) and 3,200,000 BNT (~$10 million). Bancor reported that once the theft was detected, its team was able to freeze the stolen BNT, which limited the damage to the platform’s ecosystem from the breach.
“The ability to freeze tokens was built into the Bancor Protocol to be used in an extreme situation to recover from a security breach, allowing Bancor to effectively stop the thief from running away with the stolen tokens.”
Bancor also noted that while it is not possible to freeze the ETH or any other stolen tokens, it is now working with dozens of cryptocurrency exchanges to trace the stolen funds and make it more difficult for the hackers to liquidate them. Bancor then explained:
“We will continue to post updates as and when appropriate on our Telegram channel and on Twitter. We appreciate your patience as we resolve.”
Bancor did report that no user wallets have been compromised in the hacking.