French Court Clears Platypus Hackers in $8.5M Crypto Heist

• French Court Absolves Two Brothers Suspected in the $8.5 Million Platypus Finance Cyberattack
• Details of the Flash Loan Attack
• French Court's Stand: Unauthorized Use of Publicly Accessible Smart Contracts is not Illegal
• Ethical Hacker or Fraudster?
• A Case Study for DeFi Criminal Enforcement

French Court Absolves Two Brothers Suspected in the $8.5 Million Platypus Finance Cyberattack

In a surprising turn of events, a French court has dismissed criminal charges against two siblings accused of being behind the significant $8.5 million Platypus Finance$0.031 -4.77% hack that transpired in February. The two suspected individuals, including 22-year-old Mohammed M., who was believed to have masterminded the intricate flash loan assault, were set free.

Details of the Flash Loan Attack

The young suspect allegedly exploited a loophole in a smart contract to drain funds from the Avalanche-based automated market maker (AMM) project. Notwithstanding, French justices refused the prosecutors' call for substantial prison terms. As reported by Le Monde, the stolen crypto was tracked back to the supposed wrongdoers in just a week after the breach, thanks to the efforts of cryptography trailblazers such as ZachXBT.

French Court's Stand: Unauthorized Use of Publicly Accessible Smart Contracts is not Illegal

In an interesting verdict, the court decided that Mohammed's unauthorized, yet publicly accessible use of smart contracts didn't amount to illicit computer system intrusion under criminal statutes. Moreover, employing Platypus's defective emergency withdrawal mechanism to drain tokens didn't meet the legal criteria for fraud, in the judges' perspective.

Ethical Hacker or Fraudster?

Interestingly, Mohammed argued that he had always planned to return the funds as an ethical hacker. His goal was to earn a 10% white-hat bounty. But his mishandling of decryption keys permanently secured most of the stolen assets. In response, Platypus initiated its own counter-hack to retrieve some of the stolen USD Coin (USDC) still deposited in AMM liquidity pools.

A Case Study for DeFi Criminal Enforcement

The prosecution's setback highlights the emerging jurisdiction of DeFi criminal enforcement. While defrauded protocols can still lodge a damage lawsuit in a civil court, the global nature and novelty of decentralized networks necessitate further clarification under criminal regulations.

Edited by Jonathan Stoker