Velodrome Coder Allegedly Stole $350,000 From The Exchange's Wallet

Velodrome, a decentralized exchange (DEX), has identified the person responsible for draining the team wallet on Aug. 4 as gabagool.eth, an anonymous team member of the crypto trading platform.

The exchange revealed on Twitter that it was their own team member who drained Velodrome's wallet, which was reserved for funding the developers and other members working on the platform.

The team investigated the unusual activity on the decentralized exchange and went on to find that anonymous coder "Gabagool"—known for his Twitter handle Gabagool.eth, was responsible for draining the fund.

"Immediately following the attack, team members who did not have access to the team wallet began an independent investigation, which quickly resulted in the attacker's identification and the funds' return to team control. Much to our disappointment, we learned the attacker was a fellow team member Gabagool," confirmed the statement from Velodrome.

When contacted, the anonymous coder accepted his mistake and according to Velodrome, the funds have been returned. "The Velodrome team has severed our relationship with Gabagool and are working with legal counsel to determine the best next steps," the DEX platform announced.

Velodrome also confirmed that the attempts of Gabagool.eth did not affect their funds and everything is back to normal.

"Although this attack affected only the Velodrome team, we believe it is important to inform the greater community of our findings. We recommend any individuals or teams who have existing relationships with Gabagool take these findings under advisement," the DEX said.

The anonymous coder issued a long statement criticizing his "bad decision." According to the statement from Gabagool, as shared by on-chain analyst ZachXBT, the anonymous coder transferred $350,000 from Velodrome in various tokens and swapped them with Ether (ETH) and eventually transferred them to Tornado Cash.

"I did this in a pathetic attempt to solve my own problem, to get out of a trap of my own making. I thought I could make the 56k back and return all of the funds, which was delusional," said the former Velodrome team member.

"This space can place enormous pressure on individuals, and when you are dealing with other people's / a project's money there is very little room for error. We should never place people - even leaders of projects - in a position where they have the option to make impulsive decisions with large sums of money. I don't say this trying to shift any responsibility, I just used to believe that trust was a powerful thing, undervalued in the space, and now my belief is basically the 'trust no one, not even yourself' meme," Gabagool said.