Wormhole Hacker Incident Fund Recovery: Jump Crypto and Oasis Successfully Collaborate

In February 2022, the Wormhole cross-chain bridge experienced one of the largest cryptocurrency thefts of the year, with approximately 120,000 ETH stolen, valued at $325 million at the time. Today, these stolen funds have been successfully recovered.

The crypto division of the Chicago-based trading firm Jump Trading, Jump Crypto, participated in the development of the Wormhole protocol. After the incident, the company invested 120,000 ETH into Wormhole to cover the losses and stated its commitment to "maintaining the integrity of the community members and supporting the continued development of Wormhole." Although Wormhole offered a $10 million bug bounty and a white hat program in exchange for the return of the funds, it was unsuccessful.

Senior executives of Jump Trading Group have stated: "We are working closely with government and private resources. There are many professionals skilled in tracking down such criminals. This is a protracted battle, and we are prepared for long-term operations."

According to on-chain analysis, Jump ultimately won the battle. Three days ago, the funds seemed to have been recovered. Jump Crypto declined to comment on the matter.

Analysis shows that Jump Crypto and Oasis collaborated to execute a counterattack on an upgradable Oasis contract, recovering stolen funds from the Wormhole Hacker's vault. The hacker had previously been transferring the stolen funds through various Ethereum applications and recently opened two Oasis vaults to establish leveraged long positions on two ETH staking derivatives.

The counterattack was launched on February 21, and through a series of carefully designed transactions, Jump successfully took control of the hacker's vault. Subsequently, a wallet suspected to belong to Jump transferred 80 million DAI to the operational address to repay the vault's debt and withdrew $218 million worth of collateral. The recovered collateral was ultimately transferred to a new holding address.

Considering the DAI paid when reclaiming the collateral, the net return of this counterattack is approximately $140 million.

In the cryptocurrency industry, many large-scale theft cases involve cross-chain bridge attacks, such as the Ronin Hacker incident that resulted in a loss of $540 million. However, the transparency and openness of blockchain have also proven to be powerful tools in combating financial crime.

This incident may spark discussions within the industry about the ethics and legality of counterattacks. However, for now, Jump Crypto has successfully recovered approximately $140 million in funds. Meanwhile, the Hacker may regret missing the opportunity to obtain $10 million and a "get out of jail free card."