Cysic hacker sends $744K in crypto to Tornado Cash after 10% bounty offer

Attacker moves $744,000 in Ether and BNB to Tornado Cash

The individual who exploited the Cysic bridge has moved approximately $744,000 in cryptocurrency to Tornado Cash. This service acts as a crypto mixer, which mixes funds from different users to make their transactions harder to track.

The transfer of these assets happened on Friday. According to blockchain security firm PeckShield, the specific wallet sent 300 Ether (ETH) and 30.4 BNB to the mixer.

What happened in the Cysic exploit

• The attack: On Saturday, the hacker used a vulnerability in the bridge to create 10 million Cysic (CYS) tokens on the BNB Smart Chain network.
• The response: The Cysic Foundation quickly stopped the bridge and blocked the recipient's address. This action effectively locked, or "froze," 2.8 million of the newly created tokens.
• Project statement: The foundation stated that its main network and the tokens held in existing user wallets were not affected by the incident.

The 10% bounty offer and current wallet status

On Thursday, the Cysic Foundation offered the attacker a financial incentive to return the funds. The proposal asked the hacker to return 275.872 ETH, worth about $665,000. In exchange, the project would pay the attacker 10% of that amount as a bounty.

Despite the offer, the attacker has not returned the funds. Instead, they moved the assets to Tornado Cash. As of publication time, blockchain data from Arkham showed that the attacker's primary Ethereum wallet now held only $45 in ETH.

What remains unknown

It is unclear whether the Cysic Foundation will attempt to trace the funds or take other legal or technical actions after the transfer to the mixer. Cointelegraph contacted the foundation regarding its recovery efforts, but the organization did not provide a response before this article was published.

Why the move to Tornado Cash matters

Tornado Cash uses smart contracts to obfuscate the source of crypto funds. When the attacker sent the money there, they made it significantly more difficult for investigators to link the stolen assets back to them. This is a common step in crypto crime to obscure the money trail.

• Cointelegraph