Auros Hack

TOTAL LOST $20.0M
High Other

Summarize with AI

ChatGPT Perplexity Claude Grok
Affected Chain 2022 Incident surface
Recovered - No recovery reported
All-Time Rank #229 By amount stolen
Auditors 1 Prior security audit

Incident Overview

Quick Summary

Auros market maker filed for bankruptcy. It holds approximately 20M USD frozen assets in the FTX exchange. The official statement was published on the 20th of December 2022.

Details of the Exploit

A significant amount of Auros assets were stored on the FTX exchange, which filed for bankruptcy on the 11th of Nov 2022.

On the 13th of Dec has defaulted on an 8,400 $wETH loan on the crypto lending protocol Maple Finance.

The official statement was published on the 20th of Dec: https://twitter.com/Auros_global/status/1605227442838175745

Incident Report

Protocol / Project Auros
Date of Incident
Attack Technique Other
Classification CeFi
Primary Source View Post-Mortem #1 View Post-Mortem #2 View Post-Mortem #3

Protocol Information

Protocol Type Prediction Market
Official Website www.auros.global/
Protocol Twitter/X @Auros_global
Team Public / Doxxed
Source Code Unverified

Market Context at Time of Hack

Token Categories
DEX Solana Ecosystem Binance Alpha Viction Ecosystem Binance Alpha Airdrops Binance Ecosystem
Protocol Links

What the Attacker Needed to Succeed

Understanding the prerequisites for this type of attack helps auditors identify protocols that are most at risk and helps developers build better defenses.

Technical Knowledge Deep understanding of other and Solidity and EVM internals
Capital Required Seed capital to cover gas and initial position setup
On-Chain Access Ability to interact with smart contracts and deploy a custom exploit contract
Protocol Analysis Identification of the exploitable vulnerability in Auros's contract logic - root cause: cefi
Execution Speed Precise transaction ordering and timing to exploit the vulnerability within a single atomic block
Obfuscation Plan A strategy to launder and move stolen funds - typically through mixers, cross-chain bridges, or decentralized DEX swaps to resist tracing

What Auditors Should Check

Could this have been caught in audit? Likely — with a thorough Other audit checklist and test coverage
Audited by Audit Report 1 — still lost $20.0M. Prior audits don't guarantee safety, especially after post-audit code changes.

If you're auditing a protocol with similar architecture to Auros, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (December 2022).

  • Verify all logic paths related to Other are guarded by proper access controls and input validation
  • Review privileged functions (owner, admin, governance) for potential abuse vectors - centralization risks should be documented and bounded with timelocks or multi-sigs

Master these auditing techniques with hands-on labs and real exploit scenarios in the Smart Contract Hacking course.

Free Trial

Security Audit History

Sources & References

Browse all hacks

These hacks used the same attack technique. Understanding the pattern helps prevent future exploits.

DeFiTuna $570K
Other
Cascade $1.3M
Other
Lumi Finance $264K
Other
Hinkal $820K
Other
AIDCToken $121K
Other
Polymarket $3.0M
Other

Learn to Prevent the Next Auros

The Auros hack is one of many attacks that skilled auditors are trained to detect before deployment. Master real exploit patterns and defense techniques with hands-on Web3 security training.

Start Free Trial Browse Attack Library
Recreate exploit patterns safely Free Trial