Over $80m worth of cryptocurrency has been stolen following a cyber-attack on cross-chain bridge project Orbit Chain.
The blockchain revealed the incident on its X account on January 1, 2024, informing users that an “unidentified access” to Orbit Bridge was confirmed on December 31, 2023.
🚨Urgent🚨
Dear Orbit Bridge Users,
An unidentified access to Orbit Bridge, a decentralized Cross-chain protocol, was confirmed on Dec-31-2023 08:52:47 PM UTC.
Further information regarding the issue will be updated.
— Orbit Chain (@Orbit_Chain) January 1, 2024
The attackers stole 26,741.6 of Ether (ETH), which were transferred to five wallet addresses, and around 15,498,358 of DAI (a stablecoin on the Ethereum blockchain) transferred to three addresses. This is worth a total of around $84.5 million at current prices.
Orbit Chain, which was founded in South Korea in 2018, revealed it has attempted to communicate with the hackers, delivering two messages to them. It is also working with law enforcement and global security experts to track down and freeze the stolen assets.
Users were warned that any reimbursement claims currently circulating are scams and told customers to refer to the Orbit Chain official page for updates.
Perpetrators Remain at Large
In a series of updates on January 2, Orbit Chain said that the stolen assets remained unmoved.
“Our team is constantly monitoring the stolen asset, and we promise to inform the community once the address associated with the stolen asset has taken action,” the firm posted on X.
The blockchain added that it has developed a system for investigating support and cause analysis with the Korean National Police Agency and Korea Internet & Security Agency (KISA), in addition to working with domestic and international law enforcement agencies.
“In order to resolve this issue, the Orbit Chain team will utilize all available methods to track down the hackers and recover the funds,” the firm vowed.
It also urged all members of the Orbit Chain community and the Web3 ecosystem to help spread this information as widely as possible.
There are currently no indications as to who may be behind the attack.
However, North Korea-affiliated actors are known to have been behind numerous high-profile cryptocurrency thefts, stealing $3bn since 2017 according to research published by Recorded Future’s Insikt Group.