Incident Overview
On Jan 4, 2023, the team behind the PHL Token token executed a rug pull, resulting in a loss of funds worth $103k USD.
claimTokens() on contract 0xA803 executed and allows the team to withdraw a significant amount of tokens for dumping. This resulted in a rapid drop in the token's price by approximately 73%.
Incident Report
Protocol Information
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 Philcoin, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (January 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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