Harmony’s ONE Token Plunges 26% After Exploit Mints Billions of New Tokens

Harmony’s ONE token dropped about 26% during Asian morning trading hours after an apparent exploit resulted in the creation of roughly 4 billion new tokens, an amount equal to more than a quarter of the token’s existing supply of around 15 billion.

Team Works on Fix and Fund Freezes

Harmony confirmed the incident and said it is coordinating with exchanges to freeze affected funds while preparing a software patch, with a possible rollback under consideration to return the network to a state before the exploit occurred. Such a fix would effectively reverse transactions made after the attack, though this becomes harder to execute once funds have already moved to exchanges or other platforms.

Second Blockchain Rollback Concern This Week

The incident follows a similar situation on Ravencoin a day earlier, where invalid blocks prompted miners to consider rebuilding the chain, highlighting the broader trade-off rollbacks pose between reversing an attack and undoing legitimate transactions.

Not Harmony’s First Security Incident

Harmony has faced token related issues before, including an unauthorized creation of about 146 million ONE tokens in a 2023 staking bug, and a major 2022 bridge attack that resulted in roughly $100 million in losses, later linked to North Korea’s Lazarus Group. Harmony has not yet detailed the cause of Wednesday’s exploit or the scope of any planned rollback.