Simply over a yr after a suspected non-public key hack, “Bitcoin DeFi” platform ALEX Protocol has been exploited once more, this time with losses estimated at $14 million.
The group initially introduced a safety incident, following stories of a hack circulating on X, earlier than later publishing a extra detailed incident report. The mission’s web site stays “under maintenance.”
Discover: Incident Report on Latest Exploit
ALEX Protocol not too long ago skilled an exploit that led to a partial lack of funds. We had been in a position to detect and comprise the assault early, minimizing additional affect.
The attacker exploited a flaw in verification logic within the self-listing…
— ALEX 🟧 No. 1 Bitcoin DeFi (@ALEXLabBTC) June 6, 2025
The report factors to a difficulty with appropriately figuring out failed transactions on Stacks, a DeFi-focused layer two scaling answer for the Bitcoin community.
This allowed the attacker to bypass checks utilizing knowledge from a failed transaction and withdraw the funds.
The “partial loss of funds” quantities to an estimated $14 million, in accordance with crypto safety agency QuillAudits. Amongst the tokens stolen was 63.5 wrapped bitcoin (aBTC and sBTC), each of which have depegged considerably upon being offered off by the hacker.
Equally, the worth of Stacks’ STX is down roughly 10% on the day, and the platform’s personal ALEX token is down over 50%.
Different Stacks-based initiatives have confirmed that the exploit is contained to the ALEX Protocol, however Pontis has paused its bridge to comprise funds inside the community, and Bitflow, Stacks’ alternate aggregator, is eradicating the affected swimming pools from its routes.
Final Might, in what Certik suspected was a non-public key compromise, $4.3 million was faraway from ALEX Protocol’s XLink bridge connecting the mission to Binance’s BNB Chain.
Regardless of the safety upgrades and the migration of alternate and token contracts that adopted, the adjustments have apparently proved inadequate to forestall at this time’s much more expensive assault.
