VeChain Denies Bybit’s Explosive ‘Hidden Freeze’ Claim: 2019 Blocklist Was Not a Secret Kill Switch
VeChain has issued a agency clarification denying current allegations made in a report revealed by Bybit’s Lazarus Security Lab, which claimed that the blockchain consists of a hidden characteristic permitting funds to be frozen.
In a assertion launched on Thursday, VeChain categorically rejected the claims as “factually incorrect and reputationally damaging.”
VeChain Slams Bybit’s Research Lab
Addressing the precise allegations in its current put up on X, the group explained that the one incident resembling such motion occurred in December 2019, when a non-public key theft compromised a single VeChain pockets. Following the breach, the VeChain group voted to implement a one-time, community-approved blocklist to forestall the liquidation of the stolen property.
Validators upgraded their node software program to reject transactions originating from the thief’s wallets and ensured the stolen funds couldn’t be moved or reallocated. The measure, VeChain clarified, was a clear, governance-driven response to a main safety occasion and never a unilateral fund freeze embedded within the protocol’s supply code.
The firm additional defined that the technical distinction between “blocking” and “freezing” whereas criticizing the Bybit report for conflating validator-level inclusion insurance policies with hardcoded freezing capabilities.
“We encourage the writer of the report back to conduct a deeper technical evaluate to grasp the implications of blending up these two mechanisms in a public discussion board.”
VeChain additionally identified that impartial audits, together with these by NCC Group, Coinspect, and Hacken, have confirmed that VeChainThor’s software program allows validators, by community-approved governance, to reject sure transactions, however to not seize or freeze property. The blockchain’s consensus-level checks are designed to assist decentralized decision-making relatively than centralized management, VeChain added.
Bybit’s Research
Bybit’s Lazarus Security Lab report, titled “Blockchain Freezing Exposed: Examine the Impact of Fund Freezing Ability in Blockchain,” claimed that 16 main blockchain networks possess options that permit builders or validators to freeze or limit consumer funds. According to the report, VeChain was amongst a number of networks, together with Binance-backed BNB Chain, Sui, Aptos, and XinFin’s XDC Network, listed as having hardcoded freezing mechanisms instantly embedded of their supply code.
The examine, which examined 166 blockchain networks utilizing AI-assisted code evaluation and guide verification, recognized three main classes of freezing mechanisms: hardcoded freezing, configuration-based freezing, and on-chain contract freezing.
The report cited a number of historic examples of fund-freezing occasions, together with Sui freezing $162 million in stolen property following the Cetus hack, and BNB Chain deploying hardcoded blacklists to include a $570 million bridge exploit. Researchers concluded that whereas such interventions can assist mitigate harm from safety breaches, in addition they increase considerations about centralization and censorship. It stated that the existence of fund-freezing features, even when carried out for safety functions, challenges the notion of full decentralization.
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