Indonesia’s one of the biggest crypto exchanges Indodax has recently experienced a hack. Spot On Chain, a popular on-chain analytics provider, shared that the hacker has potentially drained digital assets of $20M worth and subsequently started swapping and transacting the stolen funds on diverse blockchain networks, sending shockwaves across the crypto community. The analytics platform has disclosed this incident on its social media account on X.
However, the stats are different on some monitoring platforms. As per Lookonchain, the exploit resulted in a loss of $22M.
Hacker Drains Indodax to Subsequently Swap and Transact Funds to Diverse Exchanges
As per Spot On Chain, the exploiter converted the respective assets into local cryptocurrencies on diverse blockchains. At the moment, the hacker possesses substantial amounts of several tokens across different chains. In this respect, 5,584 $ETH tokens (equaling $13M) are presently held on Optimism and Ethereum. Additionally, the Polygon network contains 6.84M POL (a.k.a MATIC) with a worth of approximately $2.56M. Moreover, the Tron blockchain also has 16.7M TRX tokens that account for $2.55M.
Furthermore, the Bitcoin network possesses 25 $BTC, equaling almost $1.41M. The hacker disseminated the respective assets among Bitcoin, Tron, Polygon, Optimism, and Ethereum. This indicates the challenges of recovering and tracking funds in DeFi ecosystems. The utilization of local crypto assets such as Tron ($TRX) and Ethereum ($ETH), parallel to swaps into prominent assets such as MATIC and Bitcoin, suggest hackers’ common tactic.
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They do this to obscure tracks and make it harder for exchange and law enforcement authorities to trace the funds. As the exploiter keeps on holding and likely shifts the drained assets, apprehensions are rising regarding the capability to redeem the funds. Recent years have seen analogous hacks, demonstrating increasing difficulty in the tracking of assets after they are swapped between diverse blockchains.
The Incident Highlights the Requirement for More Vigilance and Latest Security Measures
This is particularly more certain in the case of decentralized bridges or exchanges. Hence, there is a requirement for a timely intervention in the hands of the network validators, centralized exchanges, or law enforcement. This exploitation stands as a reminder of significant vulnerabilities that are still posing risks to the crypto sector. It also stresses the need for more vigilance by crypto exchanges along with the adoption of advanced security measures.