Balancer reported the vulnerability to the community on August 22, 2023. Every member has been on their toes since then. Reports claimed that the breach had affected 1.4% of the Total Value Locked. The portion was later revised to 0.89%, roughly translating to $5.6 million. This has been credited to security measures that were triggered when malicious activity was attempted. However, the portion at risk represents larger sentiments nonetheless, with many members agreeing that vulnerability on any day is likely to keep investors away from the network.
Mitigation procedures have kicked in. Balancer had urged users to check the Balancer UI. This will better showcase if their stakes are at risk or not. Others can opt to take appropriate measures at any time of the day.
Here are the recommendations published by Balancer:-
- Members with pool tokens staked on the network must unstake from the liquidity gauge. Aura and Balancer are being supported for this purpose.
- They can alternatively choose to exit from the pool by clicking the Withdraw button.
- Wrapped versions of the asset from the boosted pool will require their approval to unwrap and then receive the underlining token.
Members may have to repeat these steps, as relevant, till the time they have nothing left on the network. Balancer has clarified that the aim is to get funds at risk withdrawn, unstaked, and unwrapped.
A majority of tokens have been secured by the mitigation procedure. Users can opt to secure their holding till the time there is an update about safety being reclaimed by the team. Balancer UI is the best source to understand how funds can be taken away from the network. Instructions are laid out in a step-to-step manner.
Balancer’s first post after noticing the vulnerability was in the form of assurance, informing via X, formerly Twitter, that the majority of the TVL is safe. Only boosted pools are affected, Balancer added in the announcement while sharing the word that most of the TVL was safe. It managed to control the emotions to some extent, but many members have grown dubious of the network. What happens in the following days will go on to re-establish Balancer in the market.
Having said that, some members have also come out in support of the community with a GIF that says the show goes on. Indeed, the fact remains that many members are looking to receive an update that their stakes are safe, not just from the current incident but from anything that may come up in the future.
The development follows Balancer announcing five new pools on Arbitrum and Ethereum. This includes $GHO and other tokens on the said networks.
However, circling back to the recent critical vulnerability, users of GoGoPool, Yield Yak, and Avalanche have been advised to withdraw and migrate their liquidity to a non-boosted version. Moving forward, all eyes are on Balancer taking another step in the direction of helping users secure their share in the affected liquidity pool.
