The cybercriminal sold 1 million OP tokens and exchanged them for ETH while keeping 18 million OP in his wallet. He might be a white-hat hacker, as he has not speculated with those funds, but nobody knows his intentions.
Over the past week, a hacker took hold of over 20 million Optimism (OP) tokens. However, the cybercriminal moved 1 million of those tokens into the wallet of Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin.
OP Token Hacker Might Be White Hat
A hacker took advantage of a bug on Optimism, an Ethereum layer 1 and 2 scaling solution, to steal 20 million tokens after an airdrop. However, Wintermute clarified that an accidental transaction caused the cryptocurrencies to come into the hands of the hacker.
The OP tokens, a figure exceeding USD 30 million at the time of the event, remain in the hands of the hacker. When writing this article, OP lost almost 40% of its value after the viralization of the news.
However, the most recent move of the hacker leads to believing it could be a white hat hacker. He sent 1 million OP tokens, equivalent to almost USD 824,000, to the public wallet of Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin.
The alleged cybercriminal also sold one million OP tokens and exchanged them for Ether (ETH). The rest, adding up to 18 million OP, continues in his wallet.
The Reasons Why He Can Be a White-Hat Hacker
He is likely to be a white-hat hacker, as he still has the tokens in his wallet and has not speculated on them. However, Wintermute said that nobody knows the intentions of the cybercriminal with those stolen funds.
They commented on their blog that this operation would possibly be benevolent since the OP tokens are still in the hands of the hacker. However, they also threatened the hacker with using legal means to solve the matter if he did not return the crypto assets.
Relationship of Vitalik Buterin with the Stolen Cryptocurrencies
There are still no signs of why the hacker decided to send cryptocurrencies to the public wallet of Vitalik Buterin. However, that move by the cybercriminal might not be harmful at all to the project.
Buterin received USD 8 billion worth of SHIB tokens long ago, which he burned in their entirety. He only used 10% for donations to organizations promising to help people with COVID-19. However, that strategy aimed to reduce the number of coins in circulation.
Nobody has yet been able to confirm whether the hacker has similar plans for the Optimism (OP) coins he holds in his wallet. It is only a matter of time before there is a definitive solution to that case.
OP is trading at around USD 0.56 and has accumulated a 51.4 loss over the last week. While its daily trading volume is above USD 188.25, its market capitalization is about USD 122.15. It occupies 207th place in the cryptocurrency ranking, according to CoinGecko.
By Alexander Salazar
