According to a report by “The Block”, developers of the decentralized artificial intelligence project Bittensor temporarily halted the operation of its blockchain network after discovering a suspected security vulnerability in user wallets. According to blockchain detective ZachXBT, this attack may be related to a private key leak.
The administrators of the Bittensor community Discord, const [т,T], announced earlier on Wednesday that the team is investigating attacks on some Bittensor wallets in the past three hours. As a precautionary measure, the team has completely stopped transactions on the blockchain until more information about the nature of this attack is obtained. The latest block on Bittensor’s block explorer was confirmed approximately 4 hours ago.
Source:
Bittensor Discord
In an update on his Telegram channel, blockchain detective ZachXBT explained that Bittensor had temporarily ceased operations earlier today due to another theft incident possibly caused by a private key leak. According to ZachXBT, about 32,000 Bittensor native tokens (TAO) were stolen today, worth $8 million. This is likely the reason why the Bittensor Foundation decided to suspend network operations to prevent further incidents.
In early June, ZachXBT mentioned that a TAO holder had lost 28,200 TAO, and the attacker had cross-chain transferred the stolen funds to Ethereum and converted some TAO into Ethereum (ETH) and USD stablecoin USDC before depositing them into several exchanges.
As the investigation unfolds, the TAO Foundation has not yet issued a detailed statement on this attack. Perhaps influenced by this news, the price of TAO tokens fell by nearly 13% in the past 8 hours. At the time of writing, the trading price of TAO is $230.
