How much was lost in the RIFT Token hack?

The RIFT Token hack resulted in $59K in losses on December 31, 2020.

What attack technique was used in the RIFT Token exploit?

The RIFT Token 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.

RIFT Token Hack

TOTAL LOST $59K

Low Dec 31, 2020 Rugpull

Affected Chain 2020 Incident surface

Recovered - No recovery reported

All-Time Rank #1683 By amount stolen

Protocol Type Chain Target category

Incident Overview

The project was holding a presale event just by depositing Ether into the EOA wallet at:

https://etherscan.io/address/0x5b2d21c4…388925

The gathered funds were transferred to the RIFT token deployer at:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0xa9ae2f1d…a3c966

The contract deployer added initial liquidity at:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x037b41bc…0a498d

The liquidity was locked till 31.12.2021:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x6d077135…2a3f73

However, the rest funds (80.09 ETH) were deposited into the Tornado Cash mixer together with other Ether, taken from another scam:

https://bloxy.info/txs/calls_from/0x71323ce9…14725d?signature_id=994162&smart_contract_address_bin=0x905b63ff…ec7601

Incident Report

Protocol / Project RIFT Token

Date of Incident December 31, 2020

Attack Technique Rugpull

Classification Token

Primary Source View Post-Mortem

Protocol Information

Protocol Type Chain

Affected Token RIFT

Official Website www.rifttoken.com/

Protocol Twitter/X @RiftToken

Market Context at Time of Hack

Protocol Links

GitHub

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 RIFT Token'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 RIFT Token, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (December 2020).

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://www.rifttoken.com/
02
Web Archive https://web.archive.org/web/20201227220412/https://www.rifttoken.com/

Threat Assessment

Severity Level

LOW

Attack Vector Rugpull
Root Cause Token
Year 2020

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