$2 000 000 USD

NOVEMBER 2020

GLOBAL

AKROPOLIS

DESCRIPTION OF EVENTS

"Akropolis is a software enabling developers to launch decentralized applications (dapps) that provide cryptocurrency-based financial services owned and operated by users." "Akropolis is a DeFi saving and lending service provider that enables users to generate yield and take out loans on cryptocurrency deposits." "Akropolis was created in 2017 by co-founders Ana Adrianova and Kate Kurbanova." "Akropolis said the areas targeted by the hackers had already been audited twice, and only included “Curve Y and Curve sUSD savings pools.”" "[T]he attack vectors used in the exploit were not identified in either audit." "[T]he news could mark another dent in the code auditing ability of blockchain auditing firm CertiK."

 

"We recently identified a hack executed across a body of smart contracts in the "savings pools" that have been audited twice. We are working with security specialists and on-chain analytics providers and aim to make a more detailed statement shortly. Thank you for your patience."

 

"Several of the pools within the project’s Delphi Savings pool for yield farming were drained of over 2 million DAI, worth roughly $2 million." "Blockchain records show the hackers got away with more than $2,051,159 in Dai before moving the funds to a different address." "The essence of the exploit in question is a combination of a re-entrancy attack with Dydx flash loan origination." "The attacker pilfered the platform’s Ycurve pool in batches of $50,000 in the stablecoin DAI. This particular pool allows investors to trade stablecoins and earn interest." “At ~14:36 GMT we noticed a discrepancy in the APYs of our stablecoin pools and identified that ~2.0mn DAI had been drained out of the Ycurve and sUSD pools,”

 

"Akropolis was attacked by exploiting its flawed handling of the deposit logic in its SavingsModule smart contract." "This incident was due to a bug in the protocol without (1) validating the supported tokens and (2) enforcing reentrancy protection on the deposit logic. The exploitation leads to a large number of pooltokens minted without being backed by valuable assets. The redemption of these minted pooltokens is then exercised to drain about 2.0mn DAI from the affected YCurve and sUSD pools."

 

"The hacker allegedly created a flash loan to borrow funds with a fake token in the hacker’s own smart contract. As the funds were being transferred, the hacker executed another deposit using $800,000 worth of real DAI borrowed from dYdX. The fake token loan raised the balance of the liquidity pool. When the real loan was initiated, Akropolis minted the same tokens twice, allowing the hacker to withdraw double the intended amount. Akropolis is now monitoring incoming tokens and adding a Reentrancy Guard feature to prevent the same exploit from happening again."

 

"The DeFi protocol said that it has already given notifications to other leading crypto exchanges regarding the cyberattack and the hacker’s wallet as an effort to have the money stolen frozen and prevent the hacker from laundering those funds into other cryptocurrencies across cryptocurrency exchanges, loss of investigators tracking actions, and withdrawal of the funds from the hacker’s wallets."

 

"Akropolis says that while it hired two firms to investigate the incident, neither company was able to pinpoint the attack vectors used in the exploit." "Akropolis has since issued a statement on its website stating that “the majority of funds” are safe and it would be pausing all stablecoin pools." "We are extremely grateful for the many expressions of support and offers of help we have received in what is a challenging day for our team." "The Akropolis team said it is looking at ways to reimburse affected users “in a way that is sustainable for the project”." “We are exploring ways to reimburse users for the loss in a way that is sustainable for the project, and will make a proposal to the community prior to any final decision being made.”

Another decentralized finance attack where multiple code auditors failed to find the exploit.

 

HOW COULD THIS HAVE BEEN PREVENTED?

Decentralized smart contracts are similar to hot wallets. It's impossible to know that they're secure, and they let hackers who find any exploits take the funds.

 

Proper security of crypto-assets is an offline multi-signature wallet held by trained background checked people.

 

Check Our Framework For Safe Secure Exchange Platforms

Sources And Further Reading

 For questions or enquiries, email info@quadrigainitiative.com.

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