NEAR Intents Says it Blocked $50M Tied to Bitget Hackers
- NEAR Intents blocked more than $50 million in attempted transfers linked to the Bitget hackers.
- About $503,000 remains frozen during transaction execution and requires legal recovery procedures.
- Bitget raised its total hack estimate to about $387.5 million following the Sept. 24 attack.
NEAR Intents says its security system blocked more than $50 million in attempted transfers linked to the hackers behind Bitget’s Sept. 24 breach, while another $503,000 was frozen during transaction execution.
The $50 million figure does not represent recovered funds. It covers transactions that NEAR Intents says its SHIELD risk system identified and refused to process, with about $166,000 making it through before the activity was stopped.
SHIELD Rejected More Than $50M Before Settlement
NEAR Intents general manager Alex Shevchenko said attackers tried to route more than $50 million through the cross-chain protocol after moving stolen assets across several networks.
SHIELD screens activity using transaction patterns and information from blockchain intelligence firms, know-your-transaction providers and other security sources. It can refuse to quote a transaction before execution or halt a transfer already underway.
After removing duplicate attempts, NEAR Intents estimated that more than $50 million in suspicious flow had been blocked. Shevchenko cautioned that the figures are estimates and could carry attribution errors of up to 10%.
$503,000 Remains Frozen Pending Recovery Process
About $503,000 was caught after transactions had entered execution and remains restricted. Bitget will need to follow legal and asset-recovery procedures before those funds can be returned.
NEAR Intents also waived its share of Bitget’s recovery bounty. Bitget CEO Gracy Chen confirmed the intervention and said the exchange would pursue the appropriate legal process for the frozen assets.
Bitget Raises Hack Estimate to $387.5M
Bitget’s latest accounting puts assets affected by the Sept. 24 attack at about $387.5 million, above the initial estimate of $351.6 million. Investigators found that attackers compromised a backend component of the exchange’s wallet infrastructure rather than simply stealing private keys.
NEAR Intents’ intervention covers only a fraction of that amount. The immediate next step centers on recovering the $503,000 already frozen while Bitget and its security partners continue tracing the remaining stolen assets across chains.