A hack orchestrated by the developers – The decentralized finance is frequently subject to computer attacks. Fortunately, in some cases, these attacks are carried out by white hats whose objectives are to secure the funds. That’s what just realized pNetwork et Gala Games following the discovery of a major risk.
$2 billion in GALA created out of nowhere
Gala Games is a GameFi platform hosted on the Ethereum blockchain. Its ambition is to give power back to gamers. To do this, Gala Games uses NFTs to allow players to actually hold the in-game items.
Like most crypto projects, Gala Games has its own cryptocurrency: the GALA. Since August 2021, the GALA token can also be transferred to the BNB Smart Chain via le bridge pNetwork. The GALA token then takes the form pGALA on the BNB Smart Chain.
On November 3, the company Peckshieldspecializing in crypto security, alerted Gala Games to a potentially fraudulent transaction.
Indeed, an address was identified after having minted twice (1, 2) 27 billion pGALA tokens on the BNB Smart Chain. This represents nearly $2 billion.
The newly minted tokens were then used to empty PancakeSwap’s pGALA/BNB pool.
Unsurprisingly, this warning from PeckShield and the lack of transparency regarding the situation resulted in a significant FUD. Indeed, this led the price of the GALA token in a fall of 20%.
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Developers play it white hat
In reality, the entire maneuver was carried out by the pNetwork teams. Indeed, a few minutes before the publication of PeckShield, the latter had warned on Twitter that the pGALA token had to be redeployed following a configuration error.
« A bad configuration of the p.Network bridge required the redeployment of the pGALA contract. We are working directly with the Gala team and with exchanges to provide the pGALA balances needed to restore functionality of pGALA deposits and withdrawals. »
Thus, the developers of pNetwork minted a large amount of pGALA tokens in an attempt to drain the PancakeSwap pool. The objective being to remove pGALAs from circulation and be able to redeploy the right smart contract.
Unfortunately, due to the lack of communication, users continued to interact with the pGALA pool on PancakeSwap. A very bad idea, which inexorably leads to the loss of funds.
“Those who buy on Pancakeswap now risk losing everything. Newly purchased pGALAs are non-refundable (thus worthless) and the BNB spent on them can be hacked. Once again, STOP buying from Pancakeswap, because you’re not really buying real GALA and you risk losing your funds. »
New contracts coming soon
Once the old pGalas are removed from circulation, pNetwork plans to roll out new contracts. Thereby, the new pGALA will replace the old one which had configuration errors.
All pGALA holders will receive a airdrop of new pGALA tokens.
“A new pGALA token will be created to replace the old compromised token. It will be distributed in the next few days to those who had pGALA before the reserve was emptied. This new token has NOT been issued yet, so don’t get scammed. We will share official updates in this thread. »
Obviously, many users have expressed their anger over this fiasco. Unfortunately, the pNetwork teams had no other choice. Indeed, if they had warned upstream, this could have allowed an attacker to take advantage of the bad configuration of the contract, leading to a permanent loss of funds.
Either way, more fear than harm for GALA users. Nevertheless, the token has still not fully recovered the drop it had experienced.
Unfortunately, not all hack stories end so well. So the protocol Skyward Finance was recently hacked of $3 million and this hack was not orchestrated by a white hat.
Hacks are unfortunate hazards, but not inevitable. Need peace of mind for your cryptos? Register quickly on the Binance platformTHE absolute benchmark in the sector (commercial link).
