NEAR Intents Hacker Returns Stolen $3.8 Million After Contact with Company

NEAR Intents, a cross-chain trading system built on NEAR Protocol, suffered a loss of approximately $3.8 million due to an exploit on October 1, 2026. The attack was discovered when on-chain watcher ZachXBT flagged unusual outflows from the protocol's BNB Chain hot wallet. NEAR Intents immediately halted cross-chain services, patched the underlying smart contract bug, and promised full reimbursement to affected users.

The attacker returned the stolen funds roughly 24 hours after the NEAR Intents team made contact. NEAR co-founder Illia Polosukhin stated that the attacker gave back the money, which is an unusual occurrence in the world of crypto hacks.

The incident is part of what has been called the worst month for crypto security in 2026, with approximately $766 million to $768 million lost across 99 separate incidents in September alone.