The Euler hacker is apparently taking his chances, sending money to cryptomixers

by · March 15, 2023

The hacker responsible for the $196 million attack on Euler Finance has begun moving funds into crypto mixer Tornado Cash, just hours after a $1 million bounty was launched to reveal the hacker’s identity.

Blockchain analytics firm PeckShield tweeted on March 16 that the exploiter behind the flash loan attack on Ethereum’s non-custodial lending protocol was “on the move.”

The exploiter transferred 1,000 Ether (ETH), roughly $1.65 million, through the sanctioned crypto mixer Tornado Cash.

It comes just hours after Euler Labs tweeted it is launching a $1 million reward for information leading “to the Euler Protocol attacker’s arrest and return of all funds.”

Just a day earlier, Euler sent a chain message to the exploiter’s address on March 14, warning that it would launch a bounty “leading to your arrest and the return of all funds” if 90% was not returned within 24 hours.

The transfer of the funds to the cryptomixer may indicate that the hacker is not swayed by Euler’s amnesty offer.

Peckshield noted that around 100 ETH, worth $165,202 at the time of writing, was sent to a wallet address likely owned by one of the victims. A chain message sent by the wallet address had previously asked the attacker to get back the “life savings”.

This led to a number of other victims sending messages to the address in the hope of also getting the money back.

Related: Euler attack causes locked tokens, losses in 11 DeFi protocols, including Balancer

A message tired they “are twenty-six families from jobless rural areas”, who lost “a million USDT in total”, adding that their share of funds in the protocol was “the life savings from our last decades of working in factories”.

Another apparent victim messaged the attacker congratulating them on the “big win” and saying they were investing funds in Euler they “desperately needed” for a house.

“My wife is going to kill me if we can’t afford our house […] Is it anyway [sic] Can you help me? I have no idea what to tell my wife,” they wrote.

According to on-chain data, the $196 million stolen from Euler consisted of Dai (DAI), USD Coin (USDC), staked ETH and wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC).