A researcher unlocks $2 million in ether that was locked for nine years in an ICO contract
An old ICO contract resurfaces after an unusual technical recovery. Security researcher 0xflorent contributed to the unlocking of nearly $2 million in ether that had been immobilized for nine years. Conducted with the HongCoin team, the operation allowed several investors to recover their funds from an old Ethereum contract affected by an uncorrected bug.
In Brief
0xflorent helped HongCoin unlock nearly $2 million in ether locked since 2016.
The recovery involves 1,003.62 ETH allocated to 48 initial investors.
The lock-up was caused by an integer overflow bug in an old Ethereum contract.
The operation was carried out in coordination with the HongCoin team, through signed transactions.
0xflorent at the heart of the ether unlock
As part of this operation, the security researcher known by the pseudonym 0xflorent worked with the HongCoin team to recover funds that had been locked since 2016. The ICO contract involved was supposed to automatically refund investors if the fundraising failed. However, a bug prevented the ether from returning to some participants.
After his analysis, 0xflorent identified an integer overflow vulnerability in an administrative function of the contract. This weakness allowed for the modification of a specific parameter and subsequently authorized the refund. Thanks to this method, 1,003.62 ether were unlocked for the benefit of 48 initial investors.
Two holders have already recovered 96.5 ether. Additionally, forty-one distinct transactions were signed to release the truly locked funds.
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