How much was lost in the Skate Metaverse hack?

The Skate Metaverse hack resulted in $35K in losses on June 29, 2022.

What attack technique was used in the Skate Metaverse exploit?

The Skate Metaverse 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.

Skate Metaverse Hack

TOTAL LOST $35K

Low Jun 29, 2022 Rugpull

Affected Chain 2022 Incident surface

Recovered - No recovery reported

All-Time Rank #1796 By amount stolen

Protocol Type Exit Scam/Rugpull Target category

Incident Overview

Quick Summary

The $SMC token has been rugpulled by the token creator. The creator of the token exchanged 10m of $SMC tokens for $BNB via PancakeSwap and then proceeded to launder ~530 $BNB through the Tornado.cash of which ~158 $BNB were identified as stolen.

Details of the Exploit

The contract deployer created the token contract on the BSC network in this transaction (https://bscscan.com/tx/0xa37b6029…79407c), where 100m of $SMC tokens were minted. After 12 days, 12.5m tokens were sent to the other of the scammer's addresses in these two transactions:

1) https://bscscan.com/tx/0x255ec873…d2a54b

2) https://bscscan.com/tx/0xfb3bc48e…5023f6

The tokens were then exchanged for $BNB via PancakeSwap:

1) https://bscscan.com/tx/0xef60bf9f…0ecbea

2) https://bscscan.com/tx/0x4bfe3ad8…2fe2aa.

After the token was dumped, and $BNB was received, they were sent to the scammer address (D) where they were laundered through Tornado.cash.

As the time of this writing information on this case is scarce. More sources will be added if the case should develop.

Block Data Reference

Contract creator address, scammer address (A): https://bscscan.com/address/0xa5f49aa1…e780f9

Scammer address (B): https://bscscan.com/address/0x541f18b1…93f63f

Scammer address (C): https://bscscan.com/address/0xd12b691a…732c96

Scammer address (D): https://bscscan.com/address/0xb391729a…050f58

Intermediary scammer addresses:

A) https://bscscan.com/address/0x518a0469…d6e944

B) https://bscscan.com/address/0xdae1b0e7…a0b267

C) https://bscscan.com/address/0xef428cee…c37bc8

Incident Report

Protocol / Project Skate Metaverse

Date of Incident June 29, 2022

Attack Technique Rugpull

Classification Token

Primary Source View Post-Mortem

Protocol Information

Protocol Type Exit Scam/Rugpull

Affected Token SMC

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 Skate Metaverse'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 Skate Metaverse, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (June 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://dexscreener.com/bsc/0x9c9d4a1b6b0897af511b952320b17ba42a23b950

Threat Assessment

Severity Level

LOW

Attack Vector Rugpull
Root Cause Token
Year 2022

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