How much was lost in the PAPABEAR hack?

The PAPABEAR hack resulted in $121K in losses on November 23, 2023.

What attack technique was used in the PAPABEAR exploit?

The PAPABEAR 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.

PAPABEAR Hack

TOTAL LOST $121K

Low Nov 23, 2023 Rugpull

Affected Chain 2023 Incident surface

Recovered - No recovery reported

All-Time Rank #1464 By amount stolen

Protocol Type Exit Scam/Rugpull Target category

Incident Overview

Quick Summary

PAPA token rugpull by deployer, removing liquidity worth 235,249 USD from PancakeSwap pool, causing a total loss of 120,648 USD.

Details of the Exploit

PAPA, a BEP20 token trading on PancakeSwap, faced an exit scam when the deployer removed liquidity from the LP pool on Nov 23, 2023. The stolen funds, worth 120,648 USD or 510.4 WBNB, were transferred to another EOA address and then distributed among multiple addresses.

Block Data Reference

Deployer Address:

https://bscscan.com/address/0x1B567913…A748c4

Liquidity Adding Transaction:

https://bscscan.com/tx/0xd61ab6ca…930770

Liquidity Removal Transaction:

https://bscscan.com/tx/0x741e51f9…1301d6

Incident Report

Protocol / Project PAPABEAR

Date of Incident November 23, 2023

Attack Technique Rugpull

Classification Token

Primary Source View Post-Mortem

Protocol Information

Protocol Type Exit Scam/Rugpull

Affected Token PAPA

Team Anonymous

Source Code Verified On-Chain

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 PAPABEAR'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 PAPABEAR, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (November 2023).

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/1727925400901448172

Threat Assessment

Severity Level

LOW

Attack Vector Rugpull
Root Cause Token
Year 2023

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