Radiant Capital Exploit: Over $50M Lost After BNB Chain, Arbitrum Contracts Hit In
Multisig Breach
Major cross-chain lending protocol Radiant Capital paused its lending markets after suffering millions
in losses due to a breach that affected some of its smart contracts on the BNB Chain and Arbitrum
network, rocking the cryptocurrency community to the core, given the size of the protocol.Multiple
security analytics firms delved into the massive breach, and some prominent figures in the industry
raised concerns about how a leading protocol could have been hit by a cybersecurity attack.How Did It
Happen?Blockchain security auditor QuillAudits was one of multiple security-related firms that looked
into how the attacker was able to gain access to Radiant Capital contracts.According to QuillAudits,
"the attacker gained control of 3 out of 11 signers; just enough to carry out the hack." The exploiter
then transferred ownership of the contract before draining user funds. The auditing firm also published
a list of contracts that were "in danger" early Thursday.Radiant has a multisignature wallet, or
"multisig" in crypto terms, that controls the protocol. Basically, the attacker is said to have gained
access to the private keys of some signers to control some of the protocol's smart contracts across the
affected chains.Blockchain analytics firm Lookonchain said the hacker specifically took some $33.6
million in various digital assets from Arbitrum and around $19.4 million from the BNB Chain. Assets
stolen from Arbitrum were swapped to Ethereum (ETH), while those drained from the BNB Chain were swapped
to BNB tokens.Web3 cybersecurity firm De.Fi Antivirus said $58 million has been swiped so far.Radiant
Capital has since confirmed the exploit, saying it was "working with SEAL911, Hypernative, ZeroShadow &
Chainalysis and will provide an update as soon as possible." It paused markets on Base and Mainnet until
further notice.Crypto Community Shocked by Latest HackMany crypto users have expressed frustration over
the incident, including some key figures in the industry, who are raising concerns about the seemingly
weak measures Radiant purportedly took to protect its multisig.Pop Funk, the co-founder of token launch
security platform G8keep, pointed out how Radiant "just had their protocol stolen from them like a
school bully steals lunch money." He pointed out that requiring only three signatures of 11 to execute
transactions was "uncomfortably low for a protocol of this size."Prominent analyst Adam Cochran found it
"insane" that Radiant didn't implement a set of permissions and opted for a low signature requirement.
"How the f**k did a hacker get 3 multisig keys for one protocol?" he said.One user raised an issue that
many crypto and blockchain skeptics have been pointing to in the past – that the industry can't be taken
seriously if security incidents keep coming. Another user said he can't imagine himself building or
using a protocol "that's built on just a multisig."Crypto investment platform Exponential, which has a
"Risk Ratings" feature, revealed that it previously rated Radiant with a "Watch Out," citing the
protocol's weak multisig protections that "makes the protocol more susceptible to centralization risks."