Axie Infinity returns to business after $625 million hack

Axie Infinity is back in business, still on the Ronin network.

Pay-to-earn game Axie Infinity is back in business after a major hack that stole $625 million from hackers. The hack in question took advantage of loopholes in the Ronin network, an Ethereum sidechain that the game’s owner, Sky Mavis, developed to facilitate transactions. And today we learn that Axie Infinity will continue to use Ronin, which has been relaunched after several checks. In a blog post, the company describes a new system designed to detect “suspicious large seizures.”It also promises players a new land betting feature in the coming days.

Axie Infinity is back in business

Last March, a group of hackers managed to steal nearly 173,600 Ethereum and almost $26 million (about $26 million) from the gaming network. US authorities have since established a connection between this attack and the North Korean-based hacker group Lazarus. Last week, Sky Mavis announced it was starting to provide damages to those affected, excluding the loss in value of Ethereum over the past three months. In other words, users will only get about a third of their losses. In total, Sky Mavis will reimburse $216.5 million.

Always online Ronin

Today, Axie Infinity players are advised to no longer send funds directly to the Ronin Bridge smart contract address. “Ronin Bridge should only be used for deposits and withdrawals through the Ronin Bridge user interface. Any funds sent directly to Ronin Bridge contract addresses will be permanently confiscated,” the company explained in a statement.

Esports.net recently pointed out a flaw in the design of Axie Infinity: a drop in the number of players leads to a drop in the value of its in-game currency. A few days ago, Bloomberg noted that since the hack, the number of game users has decreased by 40%. At the time of this writing, AXS is worth $15.30 (up from $160.36 at its July 2021 peak) and SLP is worth $0.0039 (up from $0.364 at its high).