Wise Lending market exploited for 177 ETH in a flash loan attack

Wise Lending market lost approximately $464,000 to a hacking incident.
PeckShield attributed the incident to flawed accounting logic with a precision issue to drain the market funds.
The exploiter inflated the share price in an almost empty market, and then borrowed most funds in the lending markets.

Wise Lending, a Web3 lending application and yield aggregator, is the latest victim of an exploit, and arguably the first case in 2024 after an exploiter executed a flash loan attack.

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Wise Lending loses 177 ETH to a flash loan attacker

Wise Lending was exploited for 177 ETH, worth approximately $464,000 at current rates. According to blockchain security firm and data analytics firm PeckShield, the aggregator’s share accounting logic was flawed with a precision issue to drain the market funds.

The @Wise_Lending market was exploited today, resulting in ~177 ETH loss (~$464K).

Our initial analysis shows the share accounting logic is flawed with a precision issue to drain the market funds.

Here is the related hack tx: https://t.co/aadbYIjX9o pic.twitter.com/FEtWW1wzKH
— PeckShield Inc. (@peckshield) January 12, 2024

Specifically, the bad actor leveraged a flash loan attack, a mechanism often used in manipulating oracle prices.

The exploiter preyed on a nearly empty market to inflate the share price. After the share price is inflated, most funds in the lending markets were then borrowed.

Details of the attack

The exploiter used an unverified contract whose address ended with …”d82c” to execute the exploit, transferring multiple tokens into the contract, data on Etherscan shows. Among the loot was $9,000 worth of USD Coin (USDC), $2,000 worth of Tether (USDT), $5,000 worth of Dai (DAI), 18.51 Wrapped Ether (WETH) worth $47.694, and multiple other tokens associated with Pendle Finance.

The exploiter borrowed 1,110 Lido Staked Ether (stETH) tokens worth approximately $2.9 million from the Aave (AAVE) lending protocol as part of the exploit.

The incident was first reported by @spreekaway, indicating, “Looks like Wise Lending exploited for ~170 ETH,” with the attack taking place at 7:29 pm UTC. According to Spreek, the exploit was due to a new Pendle Finance derivative token.

Looks like Wise Lending exploited for ~170 eth pic.twitter.com/FKivuNIKZV
— Spreek (@spreekaway) January 12, 2024

However, a threat researcher, going by @officer_cia on X, said that the attack may have been caused by a 7% swing in price between stETH and ETH within a particular pool. This, in their opinion, came as a result of AAVE v2 stETH flash loan.

Looks like Pendle had a 7% stETH/ETH swing b/c of AAVE v2 stETH flashloan.

Wise got drained accordingly (probably a 1:1 fixed exchange somewhere).

Source: https://t.co/xNR62SELnh

Info by @charliemktplace ⬆️ pic.twitter.com/9oVBL3x0Of
— Officer's Notes (@officer_cia) January 12, 2024

Wise Lending did not respond immediately to FXStreet request for comment.

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