Poly Network, a decentralized finance platform, was a target of the world’s greatest theft of cryptocurrencies. The unknown hacker managed to get away with $600 million worth of different cryptocurrencies, i. e. coins.
The network reacted by writing an open letter, urging the attacker to return the money, and negotiating possible solutions. In their statement, they also published an appeal to other members of the ecosystem to freeze or blacklist the assets used by the attacker. The Poly Network even opened several addresses to which the attacker could return their users’ money.
The very next morning, the hacker showed goodwill to cooperate and returned around $4.7 million to one of the Poly Network’s addresses. By noon, the stolen assets started incoming — according to Chainalysis, a forensics company specializing in blockchain tech, the attacker returned a total of $261 million.
However, the rest of the funds were not returned, but the hacker left a message explaining the reasons behind the attack. He or she wrote that they were just having fun and exposing the flaws inside the system:’’ I prefer to stay in the dark and save the world.’’
New technologies are expanding rapidly, and an increasing number of people put their trust and assets into these systems. This attack is just one of many that point to the fact these systems still need developing and investing in cyber-security matters before becoming an everyday part of our lives.
