The Verus bridge, a cross-chain infrastructure used by decentralized finance (DeFi) users, has been hit by an exploit resulting in significant losses.
However, in a surprising turn of events, the attacker returned $8.5 million to the protocol, while retaining a portion as a self-awarded bounty.
The exact amount of the retained bounty remains undisclosed, and no official statement has been made by Verus regarding the incident or its aftermath.
The return of funds is considered rare in DeFi exploits, with many incidents resulting in zero recovery. The incident raises questions about the security of DeFi bridges and the implications for protocol users.