- A hack affected the popular Banana Gun Telegram bot, leading to a $3M loss.
- The hacker successfully targeted 11 users, all experienced traders.
- Banana Gun promised to fully reimburse victims from the Banana Gun Treasury.
- The team later implemented new security measures, including 2-hour transaction delays and server switches.
Any news coverage of a crypto hack tends to focus on the negatives – often including a botched response from the company.
Banana Gun might just change that narrative.
The popular Telegram trading bot faced a major security breach that drained $3M from 11 users, most of whom were experienced traders.
But their response was swift and decisive and bodes well for the project’s future.
Let’s break it down.
The Banana Gun Bot Misfires
Banana Gun is a Telegram-based crypto trading bot.
Proudly ‘for degens, by degens,’ Banana Gun allows users to snipe tokens at launch and, after, trade them, swap, and copy trade. While the app is simple to use, it’s very much a tool for experienced crypto investors.
That partly explains why the hack was so large ($3.3M) while only targeting 11 victims.
The bot handles an average of 6K daily users for about 40K trades, so the hack impacted only a tiny percentage of traders.
Given that the hacker manually instigated the unauthorized transfers, the team suspected they were likely targeting select users. Banana Gunlater confirmed this – the hacker selected known traders either with trading expertise or social media presence.
In other words, the hacker targeted victims who aren’t typically easy to scam. Which was a very bold move on their part, we have to admit.
The Banana Gun team quickly shut down the trading bot to limit further damage and announced full reimbursement to victims, with funds sourced from their treasury.
Such a move, while unusual, signals Banana Guns’ commitment to its user base and could go a long way to restoring trust in the bot.
The major vulnerability turned out to be the Telegram oracle, highlighting the critical and growing importance of oracles and oracle networks in the crypto world.
Will Banana Gun Blaze a Path Forward for Damage Control?
Banana Gun’s response checked all the right boxes:
- Prompt damage control
- Fast analysis
- Transparent updates
- Full refunds/restoration
If those were standard across the crypto economy, it would go a long way to fostering greater community trust and spurring adoption.
Maybe Banana Gun, who is poised to expand beyond Telegram with a web app, will blaze the path forward. That remains to be seen.
References
- Banana Gun Roadmap (Banana Gun)
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article do not constitute financial advice. We encourage readers to conduct their own research and determine their own risk tolerance before making any financial decisions. Cryptocurrency is a highly volatile, high-risk asset class.
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