Wormhole Hack

TOTAL LOST $326M
Critical #30 All-Time Other

Summarize with AI

ChatGPT Perplexity Claude Grok
Affected Chain 2022 Incident surface
Recovered $326.0M 100.0% returned
All-Time Rank #30 By amount stolen
Protocol Type Exploit/Other Target category

Incident Overview

Quick Summary

The Wormhole bridge was compromised by an attacker that bypassed the verification process and made away with 120,000 $WETH.

Details of the Exploit

1. The attacker minted 120,000 wETH on Solana:

https://solscan.io/tx/2zCz2GgSoSS68eNJENWrYB48dMM1zmH8SZkgYneVDv2G4gRsVfwu5rNXtK5BKFxn7fSqX9BvrBc1rdPAeBEcD6Es

2. The attacker redeemed 93,750 wETH for ETH worth $254 million onto the Ethereum:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x24c7d855…3e5f14

3. The hacker used some funds to buy SportX ($SX), Meta Capital ($MCAP), Finally Usable Crypto Karma ($FUCK), and Bored Ape Yacht Club Token ($APE), the example transactions:

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x8ab3c4ad…ebe8d1

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x69786921…a41add

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x6f17f122…029ed0

https://etherscan.io/tx/0x57a48345888cbfb2d442f272c6fd9d38f57f6f5608c00c4978860eea7dc927c

4. The remaining wETH was swapped for SOL and USDC on Solana. The hacker’s Solana wallet currently holds 432,662 SOL ($44 million):

https://solscan.io/account/CxegPrfn2ge5dNiQberUrQJkHCcimeR4VXkeawcFBBka#splTransfers

Probably the issue was in the signature verification process. So it lead to an unverified call by the attacker.

Investors were made whole by Jump Trading the mother company behind the wormhole bridge that replenished the stolen ETH.

Block Data Reference

The attacker's addresses:

https://etherscan.io/address/0x629e7da2…96b71a

https://solscan.io/account/CxegPrfn2ge5dNiQberUrQJkHCcimeR4VXkeawcFBBka

Incident Report

Protocol / Project Wormhole
Date of Incident
Attack Technique Other
Classification Bridge
Primary Source View Post-Mortem #1 View Post-Mortem #2 View Post-Mortem #3

Protocol Information

Protocol Type Exploit/Other
Official Website wormholenetwork.com/
Protocol Twitter/X @wormholecrypto
Team Anonymous
Source Code Unverified

Market Context at Time of Hack

Token Categories
Collectibles & NFTs DeFi Interoperability DAO Ethereum Ecosystem Coinbase Ventures Portfolio Governance Solana Ecosystem
Protocol Links
GitHub Discord

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 other 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 Wormhole's contract logic - root cause: bridge
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? Likely — with a thorough Other audit checklist and test coverage

If you're auditing a protocol with similar architecture to Wormhole, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (February 2022).

  • Verify all logic paths related to Other 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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Funds Recovery

100.0%

Recovered

$326.0M

Net Loss

0

Sources & References

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