Posted: Jan 26, 2024 1:26 PM Updated: Jan 26, 2024 1:26 PM
briefly
Proactive vigilance and prevention mechanisms have become essential. To that end, Forta’s community innovations and tools represent Web3’s most powerful weapon in an ever-evolving threat landscape.
Web3 aims to onboard the next million (and billions) of users. But that’s not possible when you’re losing more than $200,000 every hour, as happened in 2023.
Although 2023 is significantly better than 2022, with hacking losses down 51%, there is still an urgent need to strengthen Web3 security.
Proactive vigilance and prevention mechanisms have become essential. To that end, Forta’s community innovations and tools represent Web3’s most powerful weapon in an ever-evolving threat landscape.
Nature of Web3 attacks
Provided by Web3 eternal september, developers and project owners often take security for granted even today. This is because their protocol or platform is blockchain-based. But by now it should be very clear that: Blockchain is not necessarily secure.
Conversely, a strong security framework is essential to leverage blockchain’s full potential. Because the attack vectors in this space are more complex and diverse than in legacy environments. This mainly occurs in the prevention and mitigation PoV.
The complexity of Web3 attacks requires specialized discussion. However, their versatility is more evident and gives an idea of the scope of Forta security solutions.
According to a report from Certik, private key theft was the most common type of attack in 2023. Traditional methods like phishing scams are popular here, but users who ignore privacy best practices are also to blame.
In addition to stolen keys, losses amounted to $800 million from a sophisticated re-entrancy attack, $250 million from a DAO governance attack, and $50 million from price oracle manipulation.
Prevention is better than cure
The stakes are high for Web3 attackers. They invest huge amounts of money and constantly devise new tactics to defeat security systems. And so far they have often moved faster than projects or platforms.
Considering things like pseudonymity, it is very difficult to track down and catch Web3 attackers after an exploit has occurred. Therefore, preventing exploits or stopping attackers at execution is the best path to Web3 security.
Forta’s real-time threat detection tools provide an efficient means to do this. For example, in April 2023, attack detectors identified and raised alerts to potentially stop the $197 million Euler Finance hack.
Recently, community management bots detected attacks against Telcoin Token ($1.3 million), Fantom Foundation ($7.5 million), and Curve Finance ($62 million) before they were exploited. Overall, in 2023, Forta generated preventative intelligence on attacks worth more than $304.2 million.
Attack Detector achieves this using advanced ML models and efficiently tracks malicious behavior at all stages of the Web3 attack lifecycle. Funding, preparation and utilization; and money laundering.
From detection to response
Detecting possible attacks in real time and sending high-confidence alerts before they are launched is also part of this story. Acting on these warnings is another. Until now, most projects have lagged behind in this aspect.
Web3 projects typically take about 24 hours. pause the protocolThis is often the only option to stop an imminent threat. Conversely, the attackers had by then managed to purchase 10 beachfront villas on exotic islands. That’s a huge gap.
For example, in the Euler Finance case, Forta raised three significant warnings prior to the exploit. First, when hackers used Tornado Cash to fund their attacks. Second, when a questionable contract is written. Thirdly, contracts were distributed by TC-funded EOAs.
However, despite identifying Euler as a victim and sending out multiple advance attack warnings, the largest DeFi hack of 2023 could not be stopped.
To prevent these issues in the future, our attack detector is now integrated with OpenZeppelin’s automatic detection feature. incident response (IR) Framework. This allows for dynamic mitigation responses across scenarios.
For example, automatically call the pause function based on alerts from Forta. Alternatively, use alerts from each detector bot to flag Tornado Cash funding or suspicious flash loan transactions.
While the team’s inability to control the protocol once deployed is a feature rather than a bug, the ability to predefine attack scenarios and automate response mechanisms is groundbreaking.
This is an effective way to at least delay the attack transaction, giving community or team members time to take further action. And the above are just a few examples.
Forta’s community-driven model allows users to build custom detector mitigation bots that best fit their needs and potential threats. And in this regard, we offer a variety of incentives, including bounties, subscriptions, community rewards, and other revenue streams.
Promoting an inclusive space for individual security analysts, developers, and end users to participate helps leverage the collective intelligence of the community. This is a great way to increase industry agility in adapting and mitigating new threats.
Additionally, the combined efforts and firepower of multiple stakeholders will make Web3 stronger, more secure, and more resilient. So you gain the ability to attract the next billion users and provide meaningful services while delivering and protecting value.
Our goal is to transform the future of cybersecurity in a decentralized, community-driven way. This will help Web3 scale to new levels and create a win-win situation for everyone but the bad actors.
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About the author
Gregory, a digital nomad from Poland, is not only a financial analyst but also a valuable contributor to various online magazines. With his extensive experience in the financial industry, his insights and expertise have been recognized by numerous publications. Making effective use of his spare time, Gregory is currently devoted to writing books on cryptocurrency and blockchain.
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Gregory, a digital nomad from Poland, is not only a financial analyst but also a valuable contributor to various online magazines. With his extensive experience in the financial industry, his insights and expertise have been recognized by numerous publications. Making effective use of his spare time, Gregory is currently devoted to writing books on cryptocurrency and blockchain.