GameFi Rug Pull and Accidently Closed Exchange – Beware of Risks in Crypto

 

IIn a matter of 24 hours, developers of a play-to-earn (P2E) GameFi project apparently rug-pulled their investors, and a Solana (SOL)-powered exchange mistakenly shut itself down – all reminding us of risks in the crypto space. 

Per blockchain security firm PeckShield data, GameFi (P2E blockchain-powered games) project HeroCat appears to have rug-pulled its investors. The game’s token, HeroCat Token (HCT), has lost more than 99.9% over the past week, according to data by CoinGecko. 

PeckShield said that HCT, which is developed on the Binance Chain, “made a big sale and transferred” around USD 151,000 worth of the binance USD (BUSD) stablecoin. HeroCat has yet to release any updates about the current situation. 

Meanwhile, a Solana-based DeFi project has accidentally closed itself due to a developer mistake. “Decentralized options exchange” OptiFi said they closed down the project during a routine upgrade yesterday.

“We accidentally closed the OptiFi mainnet program and it’s not recoverable,” the project’s official Twitter account said, adding that the mistake resulted in the loss of USD 661,000 in funds, most of which was from team members.

OptiFi's program has been closed by mistakes we made.

TL;DR

1. We accidentally closed the OptiFi mainnet program and it's not recoverable
2. 661k USDC is locked in the PDAs, luckily 95% of the fund is from our team member
3. We will compensate for all users’ funds

— OptiFi (@OptifiLabs) August 29, 2022

In a post-mortem, the team said they wanted to upgrade the protocol on August 29 but canceled the operation when the deployment took longer than expected due to network congestion. They then noticed that a new “buffer” account had been created and that OptiFi had already transferred a little more than SOL 17.2 (USD 558) tokens to it.

The team attempted to shut down the OptiFi program to recover those assets. The scheme worked, but instead of closing it temporarily, the program had been shut down permanently. 

“We will return all users’ deposits and settle all user positions manually according to PythNetwor oracle at 8 AM UTC on Sep 2nd,” the team said.
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Learn more: 
– This Is What FBI Recommends to DeFi Investors 
– What DeFi Offers Beyond Lending for Crypto Speculation

– How to Spot the Next Celsius Before It’s Too Late
– Nomad DeFi Bridge Drained of At Least USD 150M in ‘Chaotic’ ‘Decentralized Robbery’

– 7 DeFi Risks You Should be Aware of According to CoinShares
– DeFi Suffers from Too Much Centralization, What Can Be Done?

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(Updated at 14:17 UTC: the part about the DeFi lending protocol Cream Finance was removed as the exploit happened in August 2021, not 2022, as reported.)