According to blockchain intelligence firm Arkham, millions of dollars are either "stuck" or "forgotten" about in at least two sizable bridge contracts for several recognized crypto addresses.
In a post on April 22, X, Arkham stated, "There are dozens of accounts with 6-7 figures stuck in bridge contracts, forgotten about." These accounts included wallets linked to Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of Ethereum, Coinbase, and other DeFi whales.
Arkham pointed out that $1.05 million has been trapped in the Optimism bridge for the past seven months in a wallet that got 50 Ether (ETH) from Buterin. Based on Arkham's statistics, if the address belongs to Buterin, it would constitute a negligible portion of his $789 million cryptocurrency wealth.
Another wallet linked to Bofur Capital, which shares the same name as a Celsius creditor, has $1.8 million in wrapped-Bitcoin (WBTC) stuck in the Arbitrum bridge, which hasn’t moved in 27 months, while Thomasg.eth — the pseudonymous founder behind decentralized air transportation solution Arrow — has $800,000 in Ether stuck in the Arbitrum bridge.
Furthermore, Coinbase tried to bridge $75,000 in USD Coin (USDC) to Ethereum six months ago via the Optimism bridge, but it hasn’t been claimed on Ethereum’s base layer yet, Arkham said.
But it's also possible that the owners of these wallets have full control over the money and have purposefully decided to keep it there for the time being.
In modular blockchain networks such as Ethereum, where transaction duties are delegated to layer 2s and data availability and security are prioritized at the base layer, cross-chain bridges are essential.
However, because they are frequently automated by highly centralized validator sets or possibly insecure smart contracts, bridges have turned into a haven for hackers.
For instance, in March 2022, North Korea's state-sponsored Lazarus Group managed to breach the $650 million Ronin bridge after gaining access to five of the nine secret keys that transaction validators were holding.
April 2024, Cryptoniteuae