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[SITUATION] · [ACTIVE] · [TECHNOLOGY]

2 clusters · 14 sources · 3 days · First seen · Last updated

KelpDAO litigation against LayerZero

Overview

Evercrest Technologies, the entity behind the liquid staking protocol KelpDAO, has filed a civil lawsuit in the Supreme Court of British Columbia against LayerZero Labs and its CEO, Bryan Pellegrino. The legal action stems from an April exploit that resulted in the loss of 116,500 rsETH, valued at approximately $292 million at the time.

KelpDAO alleges negligence, negligent misrepresentation, and defamation. The claimant argues that LayerZero endorsed a specific bridge configuration—a single Decentralized Verifier Network (DVN) setup—which created a single point of failure. Evercrest asserts that LayerZero failed to disclose technical risks and failed to secure the infrastructure used by its verification system.

LayerZero has disputed the claims, describing the lawsuit as “meritless.” The company maintains that the exploit occurred because KelpDAO utilized a 1-of-1 verifier configuration instead of the multiple independent verifiers recommended for best practices. LayerZero’s investigation attributed the incident to a social engineering attack and the poisoning of RPC infrastructure, allegedly by the Lazarus Group, which allowed attackers to compromise internal nodes and forge cross-chain messages.

Entities

Bryan Pellegrino · Evercrest Technologies · British Columbia Supreme Court · Lazarus Group · Kelp DAO

Timeline

  1. 5 days ago

    [TECHNOLOGY] 3 sources
    Evercrest Technologies sues LayerZero over $292M exploit

    Evercrest Technologies, developer of Kelp DAO, is suing LayerZero Labs and CEO Bryan Pellegrino over a $292 million rsETH bridge exploit, alleging negligent misrepresentation regarding security configurations.

  2. 7 days ago

    [TECHNOLOGY] 11 sources
    KelpDAO sues LayerZero and CEO over $292M rsETH exploit

    KelpDAO's parent company, Evercrest Technologies, has sued LayerZero and CEO Bryan Pellegrino over a $292 million rsETH exploit, alleging negligence and failure to disclose technical risks.

Sources

ambcrypto.com · blockchainreporter.net · blocktempo.com · cointelegraph.com · crypto.news · cryptoninjas.net · cryptoslate.com · kriptoworld.hu · kryptolehti.fi · newsbtc.com · osnews.pl · tekedia.com · thefinancialanalyst.net · unchainedcrypto.com