Hacker stole $ 114 million in cryptocurrency without breaking the law

Abraham Eisenberg, the man behind the $ 114 million Mango Markets exploit, confirmed that he organized the attack on the DeFi platform.

I believe all of our actions were legal open market actions, using the protocol as designed, even if the development team did not fully anticipate all the consequences of setting the parameters the way they are.

— Avraham Eisenberg (@avi_eisen) October 15, 2022

«I was associated with a team that used a highly profitable trading strategy last week,» Eisenberg confirmed, adding, «I believe all of our actions were legitimate open market actions using the protocol as intended by its design. The development team did not fully foresee all the consequences of setting the parameters as they were configured,» Eisenberg said, declining to identify the accomplices.

This «legitimate trading strategy» required Eisenberg to make $ 10 million — all to siphon $ 114 million from Mango Markets. «The exploit worked by manipulating the price oracle to triple the price of the mango token from $ 0.30 to $ 0.91. This increased the value of Eisenberg’s collateral, allowing him and his team to borrow more funds under the protocol than they would have otherwise.

Eisenberg’s name was linked to the attack just one day after the «hack». Independent reporter Chris Burnett published an article providing some evidence linking Eisenberg to the attack. The evidence included screenshots of Discord chats describing the planned attack, as well as suspicious activity on the network after the incident.

As a result of the attack, Mango Markets became insolvent, and users' positions were threatened with liquidation, as the protocol could not repay the bad debt. Eisenberg noted this in his statement and said that he had reached a deal with the DeFi platform. The Mango community today voted to allow Eisenberg to keep $ 47 million and return the remaining $ 67 million to the project. The returned funds will be used to recapitalize the exchange.

According to blockchain data, Eisenberg returned tokens worth about $ 8 million shortly after the vote began.