Incident Overview
Carson ERC20 Token Suffers Flash Loan Attack Resulting in Loss of $144,000 Worth 600 BNB.
On July 26th, 2023, Carson, an ERC20 token trading on UniSwap, was attacked through a flash loan exploit. The attacker targeted the UniSwap pool, stealing funds that were subsequently swapped for WBNB and then deposited into TornadoCash. A total loss of $144,000, equivalent to 600 BNB, was incurred.
The attacker's funding was traced back to Binance's Hot Wallet.
Attacker address:
https://bscscan.com/address/0x25bcbbb9…2e2bd3
Malicious transactions:
https://bscscan.com/tx/0x37d921a6…62a3ac
https://bscscan.com/tx/0xed52a42b…febb45
https://bscscan.com/tx/0xcd781fec…df39ce
https://bscscan.com/tx/0x6a94a644…240a01
Malicious contract:
https://bscscan.com/address/0x9cffc95e…5a38ac
TornadoCash Deposit Transaction:
https://bscscan.com/tx/0xe27d7364…0dbc52
Incident Report
Protocol Information
Market Context at Time of Hack
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.
What Auditors Should Check
If you're auditing a protocol with similar architecture to Carson, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (July 2023).
- Verify all logic paths related to Flash Loan Attack are guarded by proper access controls and input validation - see the Flash Loans Attacks attack class for patterns
- 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 TrialRelated Attack Classes
The technique used in this hack maps to these vulnerability classes in our security curriculum:
Sources & References
Learn to Prevent the Next Carson
The Carson 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.