Sky Mavis, the parent company of the “Play To Earn” video game Axie Infinity announced on March 29 that it had been the victim of a hack whose damage would amount to nearly 625 million dollars at the time of the events.
Millions of dollars missing in two transactions
This catastrophic news for all crypto video game players and investors was revealed through the newsletter of Ronin, the sidechain designed specifically to support Axie Infinity. Supposed to accelerate and reduce transaction costs between players, it was the latter that was the target of the attack.
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According to Ronin, the hack occurred on March 23 and was only discovered 6 days after the fact when a user tried to withdraw 5,000 ethers (about 15 million dollars) from their bridge, a system allowing to move cryptocurrency from one blockchain to another. ” Attacker used hacked private keys to force fake withdrawals » specifies the communicated.
Two transactions were carried out by the address of the hacker nicknamed “Ronin Bridge Exploiter”: a first of 173,600 ethers (about 597 million dollars) and a second of 25.5 million dollars in USDC, a stablecoin backed by the value of the US dollar.
” We work with authorities, cryptographers and our investors to ensure that all funds are recovered or refunded reassures Ronin.
Sky Mavis also announced on April 6 that it had raised $150 million from private investors. ” The last eight days have been the most complicated of our 4-year adventure “ she says in a publication. It also indicates that it has approached Binance teams to strengthen the security of its ecosystem.
Axie Infinitya benchmark crypto game
The game founded by Vietnamese start-up Sky Mavis in 2018 has quickly become the benchmark for crypto-gaming over the years. He proposes to acquire in the form of NFT creatures answering to the name of “Axies” in order to make them fight against other players.
Based on a “Play To Earn” model, play to win, Axie Infinity allows you to win cryptocurrency rewards by competing against users in an arena. These can then be exchanged for cash or reinjected into the game.
With nearly 2.5 million daily users, including 35% of active players based in the Philippines, the game has enabled people in developing countries to earn income through this strategic turn-based card game.
This is not the first time that a computer attack of this magnitude has taken place. In August 2021, $600 million in cryptocurrency was stolen from the Poly Network platform by an ethical hacker before being returned.