How much was lost in the Boost hack?

The Boost hack resulted in $23K in losses on December 26, 2020.

What attack technique was used in the Boost exploit?

The Boost exploit utilized Rugpull. Understanding this attack vector is critical for smart contract auditors and developers building secure DeFi protocols.

How can developers prevent similar smart contract attacks?

Preventing smart contract hacks requires a combination of secure coding practices, thorough security audits, and understanding common attack vectors like reentrancy, oracle manipulation, and access control flaws. Smart Contract Hacking (SCH) provides hands-on training to help developers and auditors identify and prevent vulnerabilities before deployment.

Boost Hack

TOTAL LOST $23K

Low Dec 26, 2020 Rugpull ethereum

Affected Chain ethereum Incident surface

Recovered - No recovery reported

All-Time Rank #1873 By amount stolen

Protocol Type Launchpad Target category

Incident Overview

The project was holding a fundraising event using BoostCrowdsale smart contract:

https://etherscan.io/address/0xb7e6db68…467703#code

They have collected 35.46 ETH in total. The gathered funds were transferred to the Proxy smart contract at:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0xee145c44…786efc

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x7e8e6bc3…75bb55

The initial liquidity, using 17.2 ETH was added through the Proxy contract at:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x095fc653…aac606

The contract deployer added liquidity as well at:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x49137d8b…4aad70

The contract deployer received LP tokens from the Proxy contract at:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x5075c55e…a36d55

The contract deployer locked liquidity at:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0xfab8aaca…3d4706

The contract deployer received back LP tokens:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x90fe5580…23af90

The liquidity was removed by the contract deployer:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0xa1b3a005…20e2f6

Incident Report

Protocol / Project Boost

Date of Incident December 26, 2020

Affected Chain(s) ethereum

Attack Technique Rugpull

Classification Token

Protocol Information

Protocol Type Launchpad

Affected Token BOOST

Protocol Twitter/X @zkBoost_Finance

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 rugpull and Solidity and EVM internals

Capital Required Seed capital to cover gas and initial position setup

On-Chain Access Ability to interact with ethereum smart contracts and deploy a custom exploit contract

Protocol Analysis Identification of the exploitable vulnerability in Boost's contract logic - root cause: token

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? Hard to catch — private key / OpSec failures are outside smart contract audit scope

If you're auditing a protocol with similar architecture to Boost, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (December 2020).

Verify all logic paths related to Rugpull 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.

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Threat Assessment

Severity Level

LOW

Attack Vector Rugpull
Root Cause Token
Year 2020

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