NFT Trader Suffers $3 Million Loss in Multiple Attacks
NFT Trader, a peer-to-peer non-fungible token trading platform, has suffered a series of multiple exploits resulting in multi-million dollar losses to users’ assets. The incident occurred on December 16, and bad actors made off with $3 million worth of tokens, including 13 Mutant Ape Yacht Club, 37 Bored Ape, some VeeFriends, and World of Women NFTs.
NFT Trader has since confirmed the attack via an X post advising users to revoke access to some of their old smart contracts, which it claims were compromised. According to a post by user X foobar, the attacks ended after NFT Trader implemented a smart contract update to eliminate a re-entry vulnerability on its platform.
NFT exploiter merchant seeks 10% reward to return stolen assets
In an interesting twist following the attacks, one of the NFT Trader hackers shared a message in which he attributed the origin of the exploits to another attacker. In this message, the hacker claims to be a collector who came “in search of the remains of garbage.”
The explorer claims to have realized the high value of NFTs. They also admitted to having limited technical skills and are open to returning stolen NFTs to users in exchange for a 10% reward paid in Ether (ETH), representing 3 ETH for Bored Ape and 0.6 ETH for Mutant Ape Yacht.
However, in another intriguing development, a victim of the NFT Trader exploit claims that the same hacker returned some of the loot, including 31 ETH and a rare NFT, keeping the Apecoin rewards.
Encryption decreases by 50%
In more positive news, the total volume of hacks in the crypto ecosystem has seen a large decline over the last year. According to recent data from TRM laboratories, crypto hackers will lose the sum of $1.7 billion in 2023. And while this figure is quite significant, it represents a decrease of more than 50% compared to the $4 billion recorded in 2022 .
In its safety report, TRM notes that this reduced volume of losses can be attributed to several factors, including enhanced safety protocols, increased law enforcement actions, and better industry coordination.
At the time of writing, the cryptocurrency market is still valued at $1.541 trillion, having suffered a 3.21% loss in the last week.