Ronin Exploiter Moved $64M ETH to Tornado Cash in Past Week

The entity behind Ronin Network’s $625 million exploit in March has moved tens of millions of dollars worth of stolen Ethereum in the last week through Tornado Cash, a decentralized privacy protocol according to blockchain data.

In total there have been 34 transactions either “to” or “from” the exploiters main address “Ronin Bridge Exploiter” with the last one performed late Tuesday night for a total of $9.8 million Ethereum. More than 21,000 ethers were moved during this time for a total of $64.8 million. 

Data shows these funds were moved to privacy exchange Tornado Cash in the form 20, 100 ether trades. 

In March, Ronin Network announced they were hacked for $625 million in crypto consisting of 173,600 Ethereum and 25.5 million in USDC, making it one of the largest crypto hacks to date. In short, the hacker was able to use a backdoor entry to fake signatures required for withdrawal.

Ronin Network is a sidechain on the Ethereum network used to execute transactions for Axie Infinity, a play-to-earn non-fungible token (NFT) game. Axie Infinity is a Pokemon-inspired game where users collect and bred virtual creatures called “axies.” They then can sell these creatures based on their rareness for prices ranging from a few hundred to hundred of thousands of dollars. 

Tornado Cash enhances the privacy of transactions by breaking the on-chain link between the source and destination. While this can be beneficial for many different people, it also enables hackers to mask their addresses while withdrawing illegally obtained funds. 

Some wallets have seen multiple ether deposits from the exploiter, while others have just seen one. The main wallet still holds 151,055 ether worth $461 million at current prices. 

Author: Tyler Irvin

Related Articles