TL;DR
- Sui managed to freeze $162 million after the Cetus hack and announced a $10 million investment to strengthen audits and security.
- The incident triggered criticism over validators’ ability to block addresses and exposed the network’s fragility in terms of decentralization.
- Attackers moved $63 million to Ethereum and laundered 20,000 ETH. SUI’s price rose 2.5% to $3.62.
Sui Network published a detailed report on the recent hack that hit Cetus Protocol, one of the main decentralized applications running on its infrastructure.
The attack, which led to the theft of around $223 million, was caused by a vulnerability in a third-party math library used by Cetus, unrelated to Sui’s core code or its smart contract language, Move.
After detecting the incident, the network managed to freeze $162 million. Cetus offered a $6 million bounty for anyone who could recover the remaining funds. Additionally, Sui announced an extra $10 million investment aimed at improving audit processes, expanding bug bounty programs, and enhancing formal verification for smart contracts.
Attackers Laundered 20,000 ETH
The attack also sparked a public debate over the level of control validators hold within the network. During the fund-freezing maneuvers, several validators identified and blocked addresses linked to the theft. While this move helped contain part of the losses, it raised concerns about the ability of these nodes to restrict transactions and the potential lack of censorship resistance in a system theoretically designed to operate without intermediaries.
Meanwhile, Web3 security specialists tracked the movement of the stolen funds. According to Extractor, a tool specialized in security alerts, roughly $63 million moved to Ethereum. From there, the attackers laundered 20,000 ETH — about $53 million — through a partially identified wallet address.
SUI and Cetus Begin to Recover
The Cetus incident adds to a growing list of attacks that have shaken several platforms throughout 2025. Within the crypto ecosystem, some voices are calling for stronger technical standards before regulators step in with new restrictions.
At the time of writing, SUI’s price had risen 2.5%, reaching $3.62 per unit. Cetus also rebounded, climbing 8.7% to $0.13 per unit. However, it still shows a 33% loss since the attack. While the network avoided structural damage, the episode revealed the risks of integrating external libraries without proper controls and highlighted the ongoing challenge of balancing security with decentralization
