Within a single day, three cross-chain bridges—often called the 'capillaries' of the crypto ecosystem—were hit in a series of hacks. With over $35 million drained in just 24 hours, security alarms are ringing.

The largest incident involved AFX Trade, an Arbitrum-based decentralized perpetual exchange, where 24.15 million USDC was stolen after an off-chain validator signing key was compromised. According to security firm Blockaid, the on-chain logic was functioning normally, and the breach was due to poor key management. Arbitrum co-founder Steven Goldfeder also clarified that this was a failure of an individual protocol, unrelated to the native Arbitrum bridge. Additionally, the Verus-Ethereum bridge lost $7.55 million due to a flaw in its verification logic; CertiK noted that this was nearly identical to a vulnerability that occurred back in May. Finally, the B² Network on the BNB Chain also suffered a loss of $3.86 million.

While trust in base layers is growing thanks to record institutional inflows into Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs, the security of the third-party middleware connecting them clearly still has a long way to go. It is a small relief that the main chains themselves were not flawed, but this once again highlights the persistent risks involved in cross-chain asset transfers. DeFi users utilizing multiple chains should keep a close eye on security announcements for the time being!

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