Balancer, a cryptocurrency trading protocol, recently suffered a catastrophic exploit, resulting in a loss of approximately
$128 million. The attack occurred due to a rounding error that went undiscovered despite numerous audits. This unfortunate event has brought DeFi risks into sharper focus, serving as a bleak reminder of how unseen vulnerabilities in smart contracts can reap massive damages. The crypto community remains divided on the implications for DeFi's trustworthiness following this incident.
Alarmingly, the hacker succeeded in siphoning funds off the platform within half an hour. In an attempt to mitigate the damage, Berachain, a connected platform, took steps to halt its network. However, the hack's effects have already been far-reaching, marking Balancer's protocol breach as the largest ever in Ethereum DeFi history.
Notwithstanding this unfortunate event, Balancer is demonstrating resilience by starting to recover funds stolen during the hack. In the investigation's aftermath, they have attributed the root cause to a hidden default in their V2 smart contracts.
The effect traffics back to StakeWise, which managed to recover $20 million from the hacker through a loophole in their protocol. In light of this event, the efficacy of audits—even a total of 11 in Balancer's case—has come under scrutiny.
Balancer News Analytics from Tue, 28 Jan 2025 08:00:00 GMT to Sun, 23 Nov 2025 15:15:00 GMT -
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