NEAR Intents Hacker Returns Stolen Funds in Record Time

Near Intents suffered a significant security breach on October 1st, resulting in the theft of $3.8 million. The incident was isolated to BNB Chain and exploited an integration bug on the Omni system, which runs Near Intents.

The team quickly flagged the issue using its AI security layer (SHIELD) and shut down Near Intents for about an hour to investigate. Within 24 hours, the attacker was tracked and given a 48-hour ultimatum by General Manager Alex Shevchenko to return the funds.

To everyone's surprise, the attacker agreed to negotiate, and shortly after, the funds were fully recovered. In fact, this is one of the fastest exploits resolved recently, with all stolen funds returned within two days.

Nearly a 10x increase in crypto hack-related losses has been reported in Q3 alone, with over $1.25 billion lost since July. The recovery could be seen as bullish for Near (NEAR) by some analysts, but the altcoin's value extended its losses to 16% and broke below a key trendline support.