Terra exploit drains over $6 Million in tokens
On Wednesday morning, the Terra blockchain came to an abrupt stop after an attack siphoned off millions in token value.
Via an X announcement, Terra disclosed that operations were suspended at block 11430400 to allow for the deployment of a crucial emergency patch aimed at rectifying the security breach.
After a temporary pause, the Terra network recommenced its block production activities approximately at 4:19 am UTC. This was possible after more than 67% of the chain's validators updated their systems to guard against the security flaw.
Beosin, a cybersecurity firm focusing on blockchain, reported that attackers pilfered over $4 million in tokens. This heist included about 60 million ASTRO tokens and 2.7 BTC, in addition to $3.5 million in USDC and $500,000 in USDT stablecoins from interconnected assets.
In the wake of this security breach, the value of Astroport’s ASTRO token spiraled down to a record low of $0.01314, currently stabilizing at $0.0218, marking a steep decline of more than 53% within a day, according to CoinGecko's figures.
Similarly, Terra's LUNA token witnessed a slight downturn, closing approximately 2.7% lower at $0.3944, after briefly touching $0.385 soon after the incident occurred.
As detailed by Beosin, this offensive maneuver targeted a previously identified weak spot, utilizing a dangerous CosmWasm contract. The exploit leveraged a “reentrancy vulnerability in the timeout callback of ibc-hooks,” a feature of the inter-blockchain communication (IBC) protocol that facilitates contract activations and cross-chain transactions.
Terra (LUNA), also referred to as Terra 2.0, emerged from the ashes of the original Terra Classic (LUNC) blockchain following its 2022 demise, which was triggered by the catastrophic failure of its algorithmic stablecoin, UST, sending shockwaves throughout the cryptocurrency domain.
