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Hacker swindles $625 million in ETH from Axie Infinity's Ronin Network crypto gaming platform

It may be one of the largest scale hacks and theft that has occurred in the history of cryptocurrency.

TJ Denzer

March 29, 2022 1:05 PM

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As trendy as it has been to get into cryptocurrency and markets related to it (such as NFTs), the market is still in many ways a wild west of issues and exploitation, and one of the largest scale examples of that may have occurred just recently. According to reports, a hacker has made off with around $625 million in Ethereum (ETH) from NFT-based game Axie Infinity’s Ronin Network, marking one of the largest thefts ever in relation to cryptocurrency.

The hack into Ronin Network was reported in a blog post shared on its Substack webpage on March 29, 2022. According to the post, the Ronin bridge network was “exploited for 173,600 Ethereum and 25.5M USDC.” The ETH hack alone amounts to about $625 million USD at this time of writing. The statement from Ronin Network claims that it is working with law enforcement, forensic cryptographers, and investors to recover stolen assets and reimburse those affected by the hack. Nonetheless, it would seem the hacker “used hacked private keys in order to forge fake withdrawals,” a process that was discovered after a user found they were unable to access thousands of ETH in their account.

There have been plenty of swindles and exploitations in cryptocurrency with thiefs, scammers, and hackers making off with tons of value in various cryptocurrencies and on various platforms. Crypto.com was among those that saw a string of thefts in which crypto wallets were drained of Ethereum. There has been much discussion and argument over how best to regulate the somewhat wild market and the craze around it. China has outright banned cryptocurrency transactions and various cryptocurrency values have previously been affected by further regulations from government entities such as the European Union.

Nonetheless, it would seem that Axie Infinity’s Ronin Network is the latest to take a devastating hit in cryptocurrency crime. Stay tuned as we continue to follow this story for further updates.

TJ Denzer

Senior News Editor

TJ Denzer is a player and writer with a passion for games that has dominated a lifetime. He found his way to the Shacknews roster in late 2019 and has worked his way to Senior News Editor since. Between news coverage, he also aides notably in livestream projects like the indie game-focused Indie-licious, the Shacknews Stimulus Games, and the Shacknews Dump. You can reach him at tj.denzer@shacknews.com and also find him on Twitter @JohnnyChugs.