Stars Arena fell victim to a cyber attack that resulted in the theft of approximately $3 million worth of AVAX tokens. The perpetrator of the hack reportedly redirected the stolen funds to the Fixed Float crypto exchange.
The Web3 social media application, Stars Arena, which operates on the Avalanche platform, announced that it had successfully secured the necessary funding to cover the $3 million loss caused by the exploit on October 6th. The Stars Arena team also made it clear that they would only reactivate their smart contract once a comprehensive security audit had been conducted.
In an official announcement posted on X (formerly Twitter), the Stars Arena team stated, “We have acquired the resources needed to rectify the breach resulting from the exploit. Additionally, a dedicated white-hat development team will be brought in to conduct a swift assessment of the platform’s security.”
Stars Arena initially acknowledged the security breach on October 6th and urged users not to deposit any funds while they investigated the incident. Notably, blockchain security firms like SlowMist closely monitored the hacker’s movements and revealed that the perpetrator siphoned 266,103 Avalanche tokens, valued at nearly $3 million at the time, from Stars Arena before transferring them to the Fixed Float crypto exchange.
A few hours following the hack, the Stars Arena team issued an apology for the breach and disclosed that their website was experiencing a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack. They stated, “We deeply regret the incident. Our smart contract was exploited, and the funds were siphoned. Concurrently, our site is under a DDoS attack. We are actively working on a resolution to recover everyone’s funds and advance the Arena.”
Looking ahead, the team stressed in an announcement on October 7th in X Spaces that ensuring a “watertight” level of security will take time before relaunching their smart contract. While the exact timeline for the project’s reactivation remains uncertain, the team expressed their commitment to making it happen “very soon.”
This marks the second security breach experienced by Stars Arena within the past week. On October 5th, Cointelegraph reported that Stars Arena had swiftly patched a vulnerability after a hacker managed to siphon $2,000 worth of AVAX from the platform. Despite facing criticism from members of Crypto Twitter regarding the platform’s security, the Stars Arena team denounced any “coordinated fud” and vowed to persevere.
Stars Arena is now part of a growing cohort of social finance platforms that have emerged since Friend.tech entered the market in August.
