How much was lost in the USEA Token hack?

The USEA Token hack resulted in $1.1M in losses on June 06, 2023.

What attack technique was used in the USEA Token exploit?

The USEA 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.

USEA Token Hack

TOTAL LOST $1.1M

Medium Jun 06, 2023 Rugpull

Affected Chain 2023 Incident surface

Recovered - No recovery reported

All-Time Rank #812 By amount stolen

Protocol Type Exit Scam/Rugpull Target category

Incident Overview

Quick Summary

USEA Token project was rugpulled by the deployer who minted 867 million $USEA tokens, transferred them to an EOA address, and sold them for 1,114,468 $USD on PancakeSwap.

Details of the Exploit

USEA Token is a BEP20 token trading on PancakeSwap. The project experienced a significant rugpull in which the token deployer minted 867 million $USEA tokens and transferred them to another EOA address. The scammer then sold off all the tokens for 1,114,468 $USD via PancakeSwapV3.

Investigation revealed that all the stolen funds were distributed to other addresses as well.

Block Data Reference

Scammer Address:

https://bscscan.com/address/0xc88727cd…99144a

Deployer Address:

https://bscscan.com/address/0x11eb8c55…7a5dc7

Funds Holder Address:

https://bscscan.com/address/0x3c3eAFa8…e96CfB

Biggest Draining Transaction:

https://bscscan.com/tx/0x4cd009dd…b2eb20

Mint Transaction:

https://bscscan.com/tx/0x4e889ed2…98e417

Tokens Transfer Transaction:

https://bscscan.com/tx/0x30a1ceb1…074d09

Incident Report

Protocol / Project USEA Token

Date of Incident June 06, 2023

Attack Technique Rugpull

Classification Token

Primary Source View Post-Mortem

Protocol Information

Protocol Type Exit Scam/Rugpull

Affected Token USEA

Official Website uns.technology

Protocol Twitter/X @_unsofficial_

Team Anonymous

Source Code Verified On-Chain

Market Context at Time of Hack

Token Categories

Solana Ecosystem BNB Chain Ecosystem

Protocol Links

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 USEA 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 USEA Token, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (June 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/NumenAlert/status/1666282860389761030?s=20

Threat Assessment

Severity Level

MEDIUM

Attack Vector Rugpull
Root Cause Token
Year 2023

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