Liquid Network resumes block production after $320M Bitcoin drain
The project halted operations Sept. 6 after about $320 million in Bitcoin was withdrawn from its federation wallet by actors who described themselves as white-hat hackers.
Liquid Network has begun bringing block production back online after pausing operations in response to an exploit in Elements software.
The vulnerability enabled actors to mint unbacked tokens and withdraw around 4,000 Bitcoin, worth roughly $320 million at the time, from Liquid’s federation wallet. After emergency node updates and on-chain negotiations, the attackers returned 3,400 BTC and retained approximately 600 BTC as a self-declared bounty.
Liquid said on Sept. 10 that blocks were being produced without transactions as a precaution, with the network being monitored for full stabilization. However, the team noted that transactions and peg operations remain on hold while the network undergoes controlled recovery.
Blockstream confirmed that updates to the network’s functionary and bridge nodes had been completed and that functionary nodes were signing and validating blocks normally.