Hackers Leverage DeFi Project to Mint 4 Quadrillion Crypto Tokens

How far will hackers go to profit from a cryptographic entity? In the case of one DeFi project, those looking to mine found they could earn a pretty penny by simply telling the system to hit a quadrillion crypto tokens.

Binance CEO Chengpeng Zhao, who often goes by the name CZ, wrote early Tuesday that there are “possible hijackers” of publicly traded Ankr and Hay coins. He said the hacker “updated the smart contract to a more malicious one.” The CEO added that he has suspended withdrawals for Ankr’s loyalty token aBNBc.

According to a crypto security analysis company PeckShield, the hacker managed to dig into the code of the smart contract and exploit a bug that allowed him to mint an unlimited amount of the main Ankr token. The hacker and subsequent individuals seeking to exploit the DeFi project decided to continue until around 4 quadrillion had been minted. To put that into perspective, that’s a ridiculous 4 trillion tokens.

Ankr also wrote on Twitter late Thursday explaining that its aBNB token had been mined and tried to reassure users that its other services were unaffected. After the dust settled, analysts said the project could have been taken for around $5 million, even before Ankr made its initial announcement. Yet he offered very concerning advice to customers while advising them to reissue pirated coins. According to the crypto analyst firm Search on the channelanother user managed to take advantage of the lull between the price drop be authenticated on other sites. This separate miner took 10 BNB tokens, which are Binance’s native coin, and turned what was just $2,879 into $15.5 million worth of BUSD (a stablecoin pegged to the US dollar).

Ankr also wrote on Twitter Thursday evening explaining that hes aBNB token had been mined and was trying to reassure users that its other services were unaffected. After the dust settled, analysts said the project could have been taken for around $5 million, even before Ankr made its initial announcement. Yet he offered very concerning advice to customers while advising them to reissue pirated coins.

As pointed out CoinDeskthe hack pretty much drained all of Ankre’s aBNBc liquidity, and since then the coin’s value has dropped over 99% and its current value hovers around $1.50, according to CoinGecko. On the other hand, Hay is a stablecoin that is supposed to be pegged 1 to 1 with the value of the US dollar.

Binance remains by far the largest crypto exchange, with a trading volume of around $12 billion, at the time of reporting. The only other exchange to break $1 billion is Coinbase, but that exchange is also feel the pressure of a world increasingly critical of centralized crypto repositories. What had been Binance’s main rival for some time, FTX, has recently imploded and is already dragging other major players in the crypto space with it.

Binance itself has also experienced other hacks this year. In May, the pirates took 7,000 bitcoins worth around $40 million when they breached a wallet listed on Binance. In October, Binance has been hacked of its native BNB token worth between $100 million and $110 million.

It is interesting to note how many exchanges have died since the start of the year. Celsius and Voyager are both going through complicated bankruptcy proceedings, and of course there is FTX whose incredible implosion has brings down crypto lender BlockFi. Binance Chief Strategy Officer Patrick Hillman said CoinDesk Thursday that their own centralized exchange might not be here in 10 years, as more of the crypto world may try to leave these exchanges behind for the greener pastures of the DeFi space. CZ took umbrage with the line that their exchange could disappear in the next decade, but did not explicitly deny it either. Of course, let’s not forget that decentralized finance initiatives have been a primary target for hacks This year.