Stablecoin issuers Circle and Tether have initiated action and blacklisted more than $67 million of stolen funds in USDC and USDT, which is around 50% of the stolen amount from the cross-chain protocol.
Malicious players have been working to profit from the Multichain hack by spreading several phishing links on Twitter. These hackers are specifically targeting victims of the Multichain attack by enticing them with promises of airdropping new tokens.
Some scammers created a fake account that looked like the official Fantom Foundation account. They posted a link to a phishing website, and the tweet received over 5000 retweets and more than 50,000 views.
A few people who investigate blockchain activities have warned their community about these phishing links. It is not known whether any users have been affected or deceived by the false announcement of a fake airdrop.
Stablecoin issuers Circle and Tether have initiated action and blacklisted more than $67 million of stolen funds. Tether and Circle have taken action against the theft of $126 million by blacklisting five addresses involved. They have frozen $67.5 million worth of USDC and USDT, which is around 50% of the stolen funds from the cross-chain protocol.
As per data from PeckShield, Circle blacklisted three addresses that received outflow funds from Multichain. The three addresses, 0x027F1, 0xefEeF, and 0x48BeA, held $65 million in USDC.
Tether has blacklisted the addresses 0x37254 and 0x9abf66, which collectively hold approximately $2.5 million in USDT, according to the Fantom Foundation.
In response to the Multichain exploit, Popsicle Finance founder Daniel Sestagalli has announced that the project will burn the stolen $1.8 million worth of ICE tokens. Additionally, impacted users on Fantom Multichain will receive airdropped WAGMI tokens as compensation from the Popsicle Finance project.
Multichain Investigating the Matter
Last week, Multichain said that they have been investigating the matter, and announced suspension of further operations. It noted:
“The lockup assets on the Multichain MPC address have been moved to an unknown address abnormally. The team is not sure what happened and is currently investigating. It is recommended that all users suspend the use of Multichain services and revoke all contract approvals related to Multichain.”
Multichain has been experiencing challenges for over a month, primarily due to technical problems and the absence of its CEO. The situation sparked concerns on crypto Twitter when three unexplained outflows were observed from Multichain’s Fantom, Moonriver, and Dogecoin bridge contracts. These incidents raised fears among users about a potential hack.
The Multichain hack that occurred on July 7 was one of the largest in the cryptocurrency industry this year. Although Multichain has not provided specific details about how it happened, security experts believe it was due to a compromise of a private key.
Many questions about the hack still remain unanswered, but it is not an isolated incident. There have been numerous other cryptocurrency hacks and exploits this year alone.
According to CertiK, a total of $313.5 million was stolen from Web3 projects in the second quarter of this year, and $330 million was stolen in the first quarter. Data from DeFillama also reveals that DeFi projects have lost a total of $527.21 million this year.
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