How much was lost in the Raichu Thunderstone hack?

The Raichu Thunderstone hack resulted in $15K in losses on September 30, 2023.

What attack technique was used in the Raichu Thunderstone exploit?

The Raichu Thunderstone 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.

Raichu Thunderstone Hack

TOTAL LOST $15K

Low Sep 30, 2023 Rugpull

Affected Chain 2023 Incident surface

Recovered - No recovery reported

All-Time Rank #1913 By amount stolen

Protocol Type Exit Scam/Rugpull Target category

Incident Overview

Quick Summary

The RAI token project experienced a rugpull on Sep 30, 2023, with the deployer removing liquidity worth 60,264 USD from the UniSwap pool.

Details of the Exploit

RAI is an ERC20 token trading on UniSwap. The token faced an exit scam in the form of a rugpull when its deployer removed liquidity from the LP pool. The stolen funds, amounting to 60,264 USD or approximately 37.05 WETH, were transferred to another EOA address and subsequently distributed among multiple addresses.

Block Data Reference

Deployer Address:

https://etherscan.io/address/0xF4FA6Fc6…FFB30F

Scammer Addresses:

https://etherscan.io/address/0x6C42b841…6Feeb9

https://etherscan.io/address/0x214fBe9d…D58575

Liquidity Removal Transaction:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0xde82a653…8e42d5

Incident Report

Protocol / Project Raichu Thunderstone

Date of Incident September 30, 2023

Attack Technique Rugpull

Classification Token

Primary Source View Post-Mortem

Protocol Information

Protocol Type Exit Scam/Rugpull

Affected Token RAI

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 Raichu Thunderstone'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 Raichu Thunderstone, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (September 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://x.com/CyversAlerts/status/1709134563455209507?s=20

Threat Assessment

Severity Level

LOW

Attack Vector Rugpull
Root Cause Token
Year 2023

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