Shezmu negotiated with a hacker to retrieve over $5 million in stolen crypto and increase the bounty.
Utilizing the Yield Protocol, Shezmu recovered nearly $5 million in stolen funds within hours after successfully negotiating with the hacker.
On September 21, Chaofan Shou, co-founder of blockchain analytics firm Fuzzland, alerted the public to a compromised storage vault belonging to Shezmu.
Although it was unclear whether the event was a rug pull or a legitimate hack, Shou confirmed that approximately $4.9 million in cryptocurrencies had been stolen.
Shezmu later verified that one of its ShezmuUSD (ShezUSD) stablecoin vaults had been exploited and promptly urged the hacker to return the funds in exchange for a bounty, promising no legal consequences.
The protocol issued an on-chain message requesting that 90% of the stolen funds be returned within 24 hours, warning that law enforcement would be involved if the hacker did not comply.
Hacker Requests 20% White Hat Bounty
The hacker responded by demanding a 20% bounty rather than the 10% originally offered by Shezmu.
The protocol agreed to the terms, and within hours, the stolen Dai tokens began to be returned.
The hacker first sent back 282.18 Ether, followed by another refund of 137 Wrapped Ether (WETH).
However, not all the stolen funds had been recovered at the time of writing, and Shezmu advised investors to avoid interacting with the protocol’s Oasis vault until further notice.
WazirX Struggles to Recover $235 Million Stolen Funds
In contrast, Indian cryptocurrency exchange WazirX has not recovered its $230 million in stolen funds, 60 days after being hacked.
WazirX has not acknowledged the hack, instead blaming its custodian, Liminal, for the loss of the funds.
Liminal refuted these claims, announcing on September 9 that an independent audit by multinational firm Grant Thornton found no evidence that the cyberattack originated from Liminal’s web applications or its infrastructure.
WazirX has also faced legal threats from its customers, including rival Indian crypto exchange CoinSwitch, which initiated legal action to recover approximately 2% of its funds, amounting to $6.2 million.
