Orbit Chain confirms hack, warns of scam repayment offers

Cross-chain bridge Orbit Chain has confirmed that it suffered an unauthorized breach of access to its ecosystem on Dec. 31 at 8:52 pm UTC.

Orbit Chain posted on X (formerly Twitter), saying it is currently conducting a “comprehensive analysis” of the cause of the breach alongside cybersecurity startup Theori.

🚨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

It also said it’s “actively engaging” with international law enforcement agencies.

Blockchain analytics platform Arkham Intelligence reported the losses totaled around $81.68 million in various cryptocurrencies, including Tether, USD Coin, Ether, Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) and Dai.

Orbit warned users not to fall for any scam reimbursement offers, which have begun circulating on social media under accounts with similarly named handles.

Orbit users have slowly started to reach out to the platform on social media, asking for transactions to be canceled and to receive funds back. One user said their transaction is still pending validation.

https://twitter.com/Wisp0x/status/1741709813598277836?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1741709813598277836%7Ctwgr%5Eabef4143029c4bad25ec428518014924e19a8991%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fcointelegraph.com%2Fnews%2Forbit-chain-confirms-hack-warns-of-scam-repayment-offers

Another user posted that users are confused and “on edge” waiting for validators, saying that no one is answering requests.

0/ On December 31, 2023, at 9:07:59 PM UTC, an unauthorized transaction was detected in the @Orbit_Chain Ethereum L1 Vault, involving assets like DAI, USDC, USDT, ETH, WBTC. We are actively investigating this issue. pic.twitter.com/fKUi7bdHyk

— ChainLight (@ChainLight_io) January 1, 2024

Orbit Chain has yet to publicly respond to any of these questions from users.

The platform started in 2018 in South Korea as a multi-asset blockchain for cross-chain transactions between decentralized networks. It is often used to transfer assets between Ethereum Virtual Machine-compatible networks and Klaytn.

According to an end-of-the-year report from blockchain security platform Immunefi, $1.8 billion was lost to Web3 hackers and scammers in 2023. Of this amount, 17% can be accredited to the North Korean hackers Lazarus Group.

The attack on peer-to-peer trading platform Mixin Network came in as the year’s largest exploit, with a total of over $200 million in losses.

Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/orbit-chain-confirms-hack-warns-of-scam-repayment-offers