Euler Finance Hacker Gets Two Options: $20 Million Bounty Or Prosecution

The Euler Finance team has aggressively pursued recovering the funds stolen from its platform. The hacker stole crypto tokens worth millions of dollars, pushing the lending platform to involve some security firms and authorities from the US and UK.

In an update about the incident, Euler Finance has demanded that the hacker return 90% of the funds within 24 hours or face prosecution.

Hacker Receives An Ultimatum From Euler Finance

According to the Twitter user “0xngmi”, Euler Labs gave the exploiter of its platform two options through an injunction. The DeFi lending protocol sent a flash loan to the hackers through a transfer of 0 ETH to their address with a message embedded in the transaction.

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The on-chain message from Euler demands that the hacker returns 90% of the stolen funds within 24 hours. Failure to do so, the protocol threatens to launch a $1 million reward for information that will lead to the arrest and recovery of the funds.

On March 13, the hacker drained about $196 million of digital assets from the lending platform by exploiting software vulnerabilities. During the investigations with other security and auditing firms, Euler sent an earlier message to the hacker’s address asking if they were open to discussing “potential next steps.” 

The lending protocol mentioned that they are aware of the attacker’s activities on the platform that led to its tremendous loss. It requested a discussion and cooperation from the hackers regarding the attack details and stolen funds.

Online Reactions To Euler’s Ultimatum Message

If the demand from Euler Finance to the hacker is successful, the lending platform will receive about $176.4 million, leaving the hacker with $19.6 million.

But several reactions have been flowing among online observers on the possibility of Euler’s ultimatum working. Some people believe the attacker has little or nothing to gain if he agrees with Euler’s offer.

A Twitter user ‘drnick’ wrote that the hacker would either be on the run for the rest of his life or take the bounty deal of almost $20 million. To him, it doesn’t make sense to go with the first option. Also, the user thinks the hacker could be state actors, so he won’t bother encountering the low-level feds.

Another Twitter user stated that the hacker could even offer double value to anyone that could track him. This means that the attacker could offer $2 million against the $1 million Euler is offering.

Euler Attack Impacted Some DeFi Protocols

The exploit on Euler Finance led to the loss of locked tokens affecting some decentralized protocols. The contagion from the attack spread to about 11 other DeFi protocols, according to their various posts on Twitter.

On March 13, Balancer reported that the attack impacted Euler Finance’s Boosted USD (bbe-USD) pool. Though Balancer later paused the pool and set it to recovery mode, about 65% of the pool’s total value locked (TVL) was drained.

Also, Angle Protocol posted a report on its exposure to the Euler exploit. According to its statement, the protocol lost several tokens worth about $17 million. Others that lost some amounts in the Euler hack include Idle Finance, Yoeld Protocol, and Yearn Finance.

Featured image from Pixabay and chart from Tradingview.com