Axie Infinity’s Ronin Network Returns on Track After $625 Million Hack

Axie Infinity, the popular blockchain gaming platform, has finally restored its Ethereum-linked sidechain called the Ronin Network three months after it suffered a major breach. The Ronin Network, designed by Axie Infinity developer Sky Mavis, acts as a bridge between the video game and the blockchain, allowing cryptocurrencies to be transferred in and out of the game. In March, a hack attack on this bridge depleted a whopping $625 million (roughly Rs. 4,729 crore) from the gaming company.

Now that Ronin Network is up and running again, gamers will be able to facilitate crypto withdrawals and deposits in the game via this Ethereum bridge.

Axie Infinity officially announced the development on Twitter while revealing that the Ronin Network has undergone internal as well as external audits before its re-launch.

“Following the Ronin exploit in March, Sky Mavis conducted a full reassessment alongside independent auditors Certik and Verichains. These audits enabled us to identify and implement a number of opportunities for improvement,” Axie Infinity wrote in a blog post.

Going forward, the firm has also implemented some governance upgrades to the Ronin Network to make it more secure against suspicious actors.

“The governance process will be conducted via a decentralised voting mechanism. The governors will be empowered to vote for changes such as: adding/removing validators, upgrade contracts, change thresholds, etc. The governance voting method is serial by design: only one governance vote can be held at a time, and that vote must be completed before moving to a new vote,” the blog noted.

In a bid to tackle risks of a hack attack, Ronin Bridge now has a set daily withdrawal limit of $50 million (roughly Rs. 395 crore) which will be reset every 24 hours.

If the limit is hit early in the day, it can be reset by an administrator.

173,600 ETH tokens and 25.5 million USD Coins were drained from the Ronin bridge on March 29, 2022. Sky Mavis and Axie Infinity committed to covering all users’ funds.

The attack was identified after a user was unable to withdraw Ether tokens from the Ronin bridge.

So far in 2022, cyber criminals have stolen $1.7 billion (roughly Rs. 13,210 crore) in digital assets with Decentralised Finance (DeFi) protocols accounting for 97 percent of the total, a report by Chainalysis had recently claimed.

Crypto research firm Chainalysis has recently established a special hotline for people to flag potential hacks in the sector.

In a blog-post titled ‘Crypto Incident Response’, Chainalysis said that hackers caused thefts and damages of up to $3 billion (roughly Rs. 23,486 crore) from 251 attacks in 2021.

“That’s why today we’re launching Crypto Incident Response, a rapid response service for organisations that have been targeted by a cyber-attack or unauthorised network intrusion that involves a cryptocurrency theft or demand,” the research firm wrote in its post.