Three crypto projects hit by separate exploits this year are choosing different methods of moving forward, and users are currently caught in the crossfire, facing uneven odds of getting their money back.
Reflect, following its exposure to the Drift Protocol exploit, opened a recovery program for its $USDC+ holders on July 2, one day after Drift completed a rebrand to Velocity DEX.
Coincidentally, Humanity Protocol also pivoted toward enterprise AI after suffering its own $36 million theft.
Reflect picks up the pieces
Reflect, a stablecoin yield protocol backed by the venture firm a16z, launched a voluntary recovery plan for $USDC+ holders on July 2.
The recovery plan was created for users affected by the April Drift hack, but the connection is indirect. Reflect had integrated with Drift’s smart contracts to generate yield for its $USDC+ product. So when Drift was exploited, funds backing those positions were frozen or drained, leaving Reflect’s users unable to access their money.
Reflect said in a June 19 post that it had “been aware of this and positioned for it ahead of the announcement.” The project told beta-$USDC+ users that their DFX allocation sits at the program level rather than in individual wallets, so rather than requiring each user to file separately, the recovery can be processed by centralizing claims.
The program gives users 180 days to sell their positions to Palindrome Engineering. Holders can receive 0.20 $USDC plus 80 Reflect Credits for each unit they hold, but must give up any claims against Drift if they accept the offer. The program is already funded and operates separately from Drift’s own recovery process.
Cryptopolitan reported that Drift Protocol rebranded to Velocity DEX after losing over $280 million in an April 1 hack linked to North Korea’s Lazarus Group. Now it operates a token-based compensation system for its affected users.
Each wallet received recovery tokens pegged to $1 of verified loss, but those tokens become redeemable only after a recovery pool crosses the $5 million threshold. The pool was launched with $3.8 million already in it from remaining assets. It is expected to grow through quarterly revenue, Tether’s $127.5 million credit line, and up to $20 million from strategic partners.
Users who cash out from the pool early receive a pro-rata share of whatever the pool holds at that moment and forfeit the rest of their claim. The platform is also replacing Circle’s $USDC with Tether’s USDT as its primary stablecoin.
Humanity moves on from its own hack
Humanity Protocol, a decentralized identity project backed by $50 million in venture funding from Pantera Capital and Animoca Brands, lost $36 million in a June 9 hack. The breach started with a phishing email that compromised a developer’s laptop, exposing private keys tied to a Humanity Foundation member.
The attackers drained roughly 141 million H tokens and minted an additional 100 to 200 million on the BNB Chain. The H token fell from around $0.68 to under $0.08, erasing more than $1 billion in market capitalization.
H currently trades near $0.07 with a market cap of roughly $217 million. The project is issuing a new audited ERC-20 token under the same H ticker. Existing holders will receive an airdrop intended to partially restore their holdings.
How likely are the victims of hacked exchanges to recover stolen funds?
Of the three projects, users with direct exposure to Reflect can be the most optimistic, as the project is offering a clear but partial payout within a set timeframe. The 180-day window gives users a firm deadline to decide whether to accept the offer or pursue other recovery options.
Velocity DEX’s redemption system with a minimum pool threshold and early-exit penalties is well structured, but the DRIFT governance token trades near $0.017, close to its all-time low, raising concerns about how long the pool will need to reach the necessary $5 million threshold.
Humanity Protocol took the most pessimistic stance, with its founder Terence Kwok saying that recovery of the stolen funds is unlikely. He compared the situation to Bybit’s difficulty recovering its own losses. Regardless, Kwok contacted law enforcement in Hong Kong and the U.S. regarding the theft.