The Bybit hacking incident has primarily impacted Ethereum on-chain data in the following ways:
1. Large-scale abnormal fund flow
The hacker manipulated the smart contract logic of the multi-signature cold wallet, transferring a total of approximately 514,000 ETH (worth $1.429 billion), becoming one of the largest single fund transfer events on the Ethereum chain. The stolen assets were dispersed to 49 Ethereum addresses (each receiving 10,000 ETH), with an additional 15,000 staked cmETH in the unstaking waiting period, further complicating on-chain transactions and tracking. Additionally, some funds were exchanged for ETH through DEX, leading to a surge in on-chain exchange transaction volume.
2. Strengthening of on-chain monitoring and tagging systems
Security firm Beosin tagged over 40 involved addresses and activated the KYT (Know Your Transaction) tool to monitor fund flow in real-time, preventing ETH sell-offs. Such measures reflect the critical role of on-chain security tools in responding to large-scale attacks, while also exposing the limitations of existing monitoring systems in dealing with decentralized money laundering operations.
3. Volatility of stablecoins and staked assets
The incident led to a mass unstaking or transfer of stolen staked assets like stETH and cmETH, potentially causing a short-term imbalance in on-chain staking pool liquidity. Furthermore, the panic related to the incident affected the stablecoin USDe, causing it to temporarily decouple from the US dollar (falling to $0.98), reflecting the vulnerability of on-chain stablecoin peg mechanisms during extreme events.
4. On-chain address association and mixing risks
After the hacker dispersed the funds to 49 addresses, they further concealed the flow through mixing tools (such as Tornado Cash), significantly increasing the difficulty of cleaning Ethereum on-chain data. This operational model may drive future upgrades in on-chain analysis tools for cross-address association and fund path prediction capabilities.
5. On-chain exposure of smart contract security vulnerabilities
The attack exploited the centralized flaw in smart contract upgrade permissions, inducing multi-signature authorization through a forged front-end UI, exposing the potential risks of multi-signature contracts in the Ethereum ecosystem. This incident may prompt developers to reconstruct the permission separation mechanism and secondary verification processes for on-chain contracts.
