Things have become pretty serious for WazirX, one of India’s largest cryptocurrency platforms in the last few months. On 18th July 2024, WazirX had been targeted by hackers who made away with $235 million worth of tokens. This put the company, and more so its 1.5 crore investors, in a state of confusion as to how this happened.
Think of just waking up one morning to discover to your horror that half of your total net worth is gone. Which is pretty much what happened to WazirX too. Criminals breached an Ethereum wallet and made away with a sizable portion of its funds, raising the industry’s concern and the company especially.
Nevertheless, executives and authorities are now interested in it; the FIU, IB, and CERT-In have come to WazirX’s doorstep.
WazirX’s management was meeting with 8-10 officials in Mumbai who attempted to follow the trail of the missing tokens. Since then, they have spent hours analyzing transaction records, server information, and blockchain addresses in the belief that somewhere there’d be a trail that would point to the thieves.
Inside Job or Not?
The company has gone as far as trying to assemble the idea that the hack may have been an inside job and up to date none has been discovered. Perhaps the hackers were just that good after all? But it seems that WazirX has been doing all it can to assist the authorities in their investigation – it has met with them and provided all the necessary information that can help identify what has happened.
More disturbing than this hack is the growing attention the hack has drawn from some government agencies apart from WazirX. As FIU and others, people have begun contacting primary figures in the world of cryptocurrencies in order to find out how these types of attacks take place. Cryptocurrency is still a very young and rather uncontrolled form of business so everyone can see that there are some rather unsolvable problems here, and this hack has perfectly illustrated this.
The Road to Recovery: WazirX’s Plan
WazirX is actively involved in making things happen in the industry it operates in. Singapore-based WazirX owned by Zettai Pte has received a four-month respite from a Singapore court. This provides them with some cover to realign their crypto exposures without the fear of getting locked out by regulators in the process.
This is about the time that WazirX is forming a 10 member CoC that is supposed to be in place by October 9, 2024. This committee will assist the exchange to deal with the business restructuring plan as the exchange hopes to distribute 52-55% of the remaining assets to its clients in the next six months.
Potential White Knights: Could They Save the Day?
But that’s not all. Zettai Pte has also been ‘talking’ to 11 different crypto exchanges and trading businesses about having a ‘white knight’ or hero of sorts to bail them out of this particular mess. To the best of our knowledge, three plans have been presented to the industry by major cryptocurrency trading platforms. The following propositions can help WazirX states, sources of funds, ranging from injections of capital, platform tokens, Air Drops, and revenue-sharing projects.
The Hunt for the Hackers
Security is the biggest concern where WazirX is partnering with the experts like ZeroShadow, which is a Web3 security solution and Kroll which is a financial as well as risk advisory. They are trying to track the stolen assets and find out what to do next, and are doing it together. I hope that they were able to get some of the stolen crypto back; otherwise, the main victims will remain the clients.
