How much was lost in the Metaland DAO hack?

The Metaland DAO hack resulted in $287K in losses on January 07, 2022.

What attack technique was used in the Metaland DAO exploit?

The Metaland DAO 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.

Metaland DAO Hack

TOTAL LOST $287K

Low Jan 07, 2022 Rugpull

Affected Chain 2022 Incident surface

Recovered - No recovery reported

All-Time Rank #1163 By amount stolen

Protocol Type Exit Scam/Rugpull Target category

Incident Overview

According to the PeckShield alerts, they have detected that Metaland DAO stole more than 640 WBNB

Incident Report

Protocol / Project Metaland DAO

Date of Incident January 07, 2022

Attack Technique Rugpull

Classification Other

Primary Source View Post-Mortem #1 View Post-Mortem #2

Protocol Information

Protocol Type Exit Scam/Rugpull

Affected Token META

Official Website metalanddao.io/

Protocol Twitter/X @DaoMetaland

Team Anonymous

Source Code Unverified

Market Context at Time of Hack

Token Categories

Medium of Exchange Payments Layer 2 Metal Ecosystem Binance Ecosystem Binance Listing

Protocol Links

Discord Reddit

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 smart contracts and deploy a custom exploit contract

Protocol Analysis Identification of the exploitable vulnerability in Metaland DAO's contract logic - root cause: other

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 Metaland DAO, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (January 2022).

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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Sources & References

01
Source 1 https://twitter.com/PeckShieldAlert/status/1479281757967257602
02
Source 2 https://www.altcoinbuzz.io/cryptocurrency-news/metaland-dao-list…

Threat Assessment

Severity Level

LOW

Attack Vector Rugpull
Root Cause Other
Year 2022

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