Last year, the cryptocurrency market experienced many ups and downs, among which the security vulnerability incident of the Shibarium cross-chain bridge became a very illustrative case.

On September 12, 2025, the Shibarium team disclosed a cross-chain bridge attack. The details of this incident are worth examining—the attacker’s methods were much more sophisticated than typical hacking events. According to the security update released by the official, the hacker borrowed 4.6 million BONE tokens through a flash loan and then used these funds to attack the cross-chain bridge. This approach clearly indicates one thing: hackers’ understanding of DeFi mechanisms has reached a very advanced level.

As the governance token of Shibarium, BONE’s price plummeted by 16.32% immediately after the incident was revealed, and the market’s reaction was swift. This price fluctuation reflects the market’s concern over the project’s security.

More interestingly, in the year-end summary, Kaal Dhairya, the development lead of the Shibarium team, admitted that 2025 was the "most difficult period in the project’s history." Such honesty is rare in cryptocurrency projects, especially coming from a team that started with meme coins. He also publicly mentioned for the first time that he had been interviewed by federal agents, responding to external doubts about how the entire security incident was handled.

This incident demonstrates a reality: even leading blockchain projects still face security risks. As a key infrastructure in the DeFi ecosystem, cross-chain bridges are vulnerable, and once exploited, the impact can be widespread. However, from the team’s attitude towards handling the situation, their choice to face the issue openly rather than deflect may actually be a turning point in rebuilding community trust.