White Hat Hacker to Return Most of 4,000 BTC After Liquid Network Vulnerability Is Fixed

Odaily Planet Daily reports that, according to Galaxy’s research lead, the Liquid white-hat hacker stated that most of the 4,000 BTC stolen will be returned after the Liquid Network vulnerability is patched. The hacker communicated with Blockstream via OP_RETURN messages and PGP-encrypted text: In block 965,822, a Blockstream address sent 1,000 satoshis with the message, “Please contact the security team via Blockstream’s official website”; in block 965,865, the hacker sent an encrypted message to their own key, accompanied by a detached PGP signature verifiable using Blockstream’s publicly disclosed key; in block 965,869, the hacker performed a self-spending transaction sending 1,000 satoshis to the Liquid Federation peg wallet with the message, “Can we return most of the funds to the federation address?”; in block 965,875, the hacker performed another self-spending transaction, sending 1,000 satoshis to the federation peg wallet and adding an OP_RETURN message: “Please patch the vulnerability first. There is currently a risk on-chain as of the latest submitted version. Ensure all nodes have applied the patch. Once confirmed fixed, we will securely return the funds.” All technical details were encrypted via PGP to Blockstream’s publicly disclosed key and are readable only by Blockstream.