Key facts
- NEAR Intents blocked over $50 million in attempted transfers linked to the Bitget hack.
- Attackers stole $387.5 million from the Bitget exchange on Thursday.
- NEAR Intents' SHIELD system detected and blocked the funds, with some passing through to other providers.
- NEAR Intents managed to freeze $503,000 in funds during execution.
- Approximately $166,000 in suspected stolen funds passed through NEAR Intents.
- NEAR Intents will forego the 5% bounty offered by Bitget for freezing and recovering attacker funds.
NEAR Intents announced on Thursday that its SHIELD system successfully blocked over $50 million in attempted transfers linked to the recent Bitget exchange hack. Attackers had stolen $387.5 million from Bitget earlier that day. Alex Shevchenko, general manager of NEAR Intents, stated that a significant portion of the stolen funds moved across chains to Ethereum, where his protocol detected and prevented the movement of over $50 million. While some funds passed through to other providers, NEAR Intents managed to freeze $503,000 during execution, with approximately $166,000 in suspected stolen funds also passing through.
The incident highlights a tension within the cryptocurrency space: permissionless protocols aim for open access but face pressure to curb illicit activities. Shevchenko argued that such systems are not inherently neutral and that NEAR Intents made a choice not to facilitate the laundering of stolen assets. He emphasized that a financial system protecting thieves is not a freer system and cannot serve as an economic backbone for the future.
NEAR Intents has opted to forgo the 5% bounty offered by Bitget for freezing attacker funds and an additional 5% for their recovery, aiming to return more funds to the exchange through legal processes. This action follows similar moves by Circle and Tether, which blacklisted wallets linked to the Bitget exploiter on Friday, freezing $318,013 in USDT and USDC, according to on-chain data.
Bitget CEO Gracy Chen had urged THORChain, a decentralized cross-chain asset swapping protocol, to refuse services to addresses associated with the attack. THORChain, however, maintained its design principle of not censoring transactions, noting that past network halts were broad security measures, not selective freezes.