Hackers steal $320M in bitcoin from Liquid Network, return most of it after patch
Hackers stole about $320 million worth of bitcoin over the weekend from a blockchain platform called the Liquid Network.
In a somewhat unusual development, the attackers returned most of the haul earlier today. They retained 598 of the 4,000 stolen bitcoin, or about $47 million worth. The hackers stated that they would keep the funds as a “bounty” for bringing attention to a vulnerability in the Liquid Network.
The Liquid Network was launched in 2018 by a venture-backed cryptocurrency company called Blockstream Inc. It’s a layer two Bitcoin network, a blockchain built on the infrastructure that powers Bitcoin. Such blockchains are also known as sidechains.
Bitcoin processes user transactions through a decentralized process. When a bitcoin holder moves funds, thousands of user-operated servers called full nodes verify the authenticity of the transaction. From there, a user with bitcoin mining hardware formalizes the transaction by performing an energy-intensive processing task.
