THORChain rejects Bitget request to block hacker as $6 million moves to bitcoin

Crypto exchange Bitget lost about $388 million in a Sept. 24 breach after an attacker bypassed security controls protecting its exchange wallets. The company has since said it has identified and fixed the vulnerability, though it has not publicly detailed how the attacker gained access.

The exchange had published attacker addresses and offered a 5% bounty for eligible efforts that freeze or recover stolen funds. As the attacker moved those assets through other services, Bitget CEO Gracy Chen publicly asked THORChain over the weekend to refuse the transactions.

“Our attacker addresses are publicly listed and actively tracked. We are formally asking @THORChain to refuse service to these addresses,” she wrote on X. “Decentralization is a design principle, not a shield for facilitating known stolen funds.”

THORChain’s public response on Monday defended its policy of allowing anyone to use the network and distinguished its emergency shutdown controls from an address blocklist.

“A THORChain network halt is an emergency security mechanism designed to protect the protocol,” the project wrote. “A halt is not a selective freeze of specific funds or an individual swap.”

Its operators do have controls that can interrupt trading, the team said. THORChain’s documentation describes settings that stop swaps across every connected blockchain or restrict activity involving a particular chain, such as Ethereum. Using those controls would also interrupt other users’ transactions on the affected routes.