April 2025 Exploit Analysis from Olympix Recent weeks have seen sophisticated attackers exploit vulnerabilities in DeFi protocols, resulting in $2,025,000 in cumulative losses across three major incidents. 𝗥𝗲𝗰𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗠𝗮𝗷𝗼𝗿 𝗜𝗻𝗰𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀: 1️⃣ Filament Finance (Sei Labs): $572K lost through price manipulation. Root Cause: Artificially inflated token prices through fake orders and leveraged positions. 𝗔𝘁𝘁𝗮𝗰𝗸 𝗩𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿: • Deployed multiple contracts to place large fake buy orders. • Created undercollateralized leveraged positions. • Crashed prices via fake sell orders, triggering self-liquidation at favorable rates. Key Takeaway: Price oracle manipulation remains a systemic risk. Protocols must implement time-weighted average price (TWAP) checks and circuit breakers for outlier pricing. 2️⃣ Webkey (BSC): $737K extracted via parameter misconfiguration. Root Cause: Misconfigured currentSaleInfo parameter enabled token purchases at artificially low prices. 𝗔𝘁𝘁𝗮𝗰𝗸 𝗩𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿: • Exploited fixed low _𝘱𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘦 value in 𝘣𝘶𝘺() function. • Acquired wkeyDao tokens cheaply and dumped them at market rates on DEXs. Key Takeaway: Administrative controls (e.g., mutable parameters) require multi-sig governance and real-time monitoring for unauthorized changes. 3️⃣ Venus (ZKsync): $716K compromised through exchange rate manipulation. Root Cause: Donation attack to manipulate the 𝘸𝘜𝘚𝘋𝘔 exchange rate. 𝗔𝘁𝘁𝗮𝗰𝗸 𝗩𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿: • Borrowed 2,100 WETH via AAVE flash loan. • Looped collateral deposits to borrow 2.6M wUSDM. • Donated USDM to inflate the exchange rate, enabling profit extraction. Key Takeaway: Isolate donation functions from collateral valuation logic. Implement borrow caps and flash loan-resistant checks.
