Dego Finance Hack

TOTAL LOST $15.4M
High Access Control

Summarize with AI

ChatGPT Perplexity Claude Grok
Affected Chain 2022 Incident surface
Recovered - No recovery reported
All-Time Rank #260 By amount stolen
Protocol Type Services Target category

Incident Overview

Quick Summary

Hacker compromised contract deployer's key, withdrew all funds, removed liquidity, and transferred assets to external wallets.

Details of the Exploit

The hacker managed to compromise the contract deployer's key. This gave them access to all funds which they promptly withdrew. They then proceeded to remove liquidity from the contract.

The funds were then transferred to the hacker's external wallet. A part of the stolen funds was also transferred to another external wallet. The DEGO team has attempted to contact the hacker but it is unclear if they have been successful.

The exploit affected multiple chains including BSC, Cronos, and Ethereum.

Block Data Reference

Hacker's Address:

https://bscscan.com/address/0x118203b0…ef5c91

BSC Transfers:

https://bscscan.com/tx/0x37c471f8…e7fa3e

https://bscscan.com/tx/0x586dcc85…178ae6

https://bscscan.com/tx/0x62dc9b35…8ab4b6

https://bscscan.com/tx/0xe5dfcbc6…069e67

BSC Liquidity Removals:

https://bscscan.com/tx/0x8c1747c9…ad84d6

https://bscscan.com/tx/0xc7f88c86…d8e288

BSC Withdrawals:

https://bscscan.com/tx/0xa4fc71b3…43245f

https://bscscan.com/tx/0xfe67e929…c8e7f8

https://bscscan.com/tx/0xfa8ed0fe…a1442f

https://bscscan.com/tx/0x4ba4809c…93290d

Transfer to External Wallet:

https://bscscan.com/tx/0xdf5762c2…b4ec67

Cronos Address:

https://cronoscan.com/address/0x118203b0…ef5c91#tokentxns

Ethereum Transfers:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x3beef4cc…1a08cc

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x73529e7f…b50995

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x0e9dde95…2d671f

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x62e10626…ae7272

Ethereum Withdrawals:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x0092b357…326233

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x5855a0c1…02cf63

https://etherscan.io/tx/0xbabb03a9…385fa7

Ethereum Tornado Deposits:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x152f91e2…fa5a2f

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x0c84d2c6…a771dd

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x59dc8303…bc8e3a

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x59871d49…53fb73

Transfer to External Wallet:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0xf837e753…3be350

DEGO Team's Attempt to Contact Hacker:

https://bscscan.com/tx/0x065fa878…e4ced5

This is classified as a Access Control Attacks . Compare similar hacks →

Incident Report

Protocol / Project Dego Finance
Date of Incident
Attack Technique Access Control
Classification NFT,Gaming / Metaverse / NFT,Gaming / Metaverse / NFT,Gaming / Metaverse / NFT,Gaming / Metaverse / NFT,Gaming / Metaverse / NFT,Gaming / Metaverse / NFT,Gaming / Metaverse / NFT,Gaming / Metaverse / NFT,Gaming / Metaverse / NFT,Gaming / Metaverse / NFT,G
Primary Source View Post-Mortem #1 View Post-Mortem #2

Protocol Information

Protocol Type Services
Affected Token DEGO
Official Website dego.finance/
Protocol Twitter/X @dego_finance
Team Anonymous
Source Code Unverified

Market Context at Time of Hack

Token Categories
Collectibles & NFTs DeFi DAO Ethereum Ecosystem Governance Binance Launchpad Solana Ecosystem BNB Chain Ecosystem
Protocol Links
Discord

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 Operational-security tradecraft (phishing, malware, leaked seed phrases, or insider access) to obtain treasury signing authority
Capital Required Minimal capital - only enough to cover gas while draining the compromised accounts
On-Chain Access Valid signing authority over the compromised wallets / multisig signers, allowing direct transfer of funds or stake authorization
Target Reconnaissance Identification of Dego Finance's high-value treasury accounts and the authority / multisig structure controlling them
Execution Speed Speed to drain the compromised accounts before the team detects the breach and revokes signing authority or freezes the assets
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 Access Control audit checklist and test coverage

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

  • Verify all logic paths related to Access Control are guarded by proper access controls and input validation - see the Access Control 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.

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Related Attack Classes

The technique used in this hack maps to these vulnerability classes in our security curriculum:

See all Access Control Attacks examples →

Access Control Attacks

Sources & References

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