US crypto firm Harmony said Friday that thieves stole about $100 million worth of digital coins from one of its flagship products, the latest in a series of cyber heists in an industry that has long been the target of hackers.
Harmony is developing blockchains for so-called decentralized financing – peer-to-peer sites that offer loans and other services without the traditional gatekeepers like banks – and non-fungible tokens.
The California-based company said the heist hit its Horizon “bridge,” a tool for transferring crypto between different blockchains — the underlying software used by digital tokens such as bitcoin and ether.
Thefts have long plagued companies in the crypto sector, with blockchain bridges increasingly being targeted. More than $1 billion has been stolen from bridges so far by 2022, according to London-based blockchain analytics firm Elliptic.
Harmony tweeted that it was “working with national authorities and forensic specialists to identify the perpetrator and recover the stolen funds,” without providing further details.
It did not immediately respond to requests for comment sent via email and social media.
Elliptic, which tracks publicly visible blockchain data, said the hackers stole a number of different cryptocurrencies from Harmony, including ether, Tether and USD Coin, which they later traded for ether using so-called decentralized exchanges.
In March, hackers stole about $615 million worth of cryptocurrency from Ronin Bridge, which was used to transfer crypto in and out of the game Axie Infinity. The United States has linked North Korean hackers to the theft, one of the most common.