BonkDAO Treasury Targeted by Malicious Governance Proposal Attack @bonk_inu
A proposal called Sowellian BonkDAO—corresponding to Bonk Improvement Proposal #76 —was packaged as a governance reform plan. It proposed replacing members and the committees, rebuilding the DAO, reactivating assets, and also promised to distribute BONK rewards to addresses that vote in favor.
After the proposal passed, about 44 trillion BONK were transferred out of the BonkDAO treasury, valued at roughly $19.3 million to $20 million at the time. The funds flowed to a wallet ending with JHvQ. On-chain tracking shows that this address had previously received financial support from a Bybit account. Later the same day, these tokens were transferred again to another Solana address ending with eh42. As of now, the BONK rewards that were promised to the participants who voted in favor have not been actually distributed.
The attackers did not crack private keys or exploit any disclosed contract vulnerabilities. The attack path occurred at the governance layer. The attackers first accumulated BONK holdings and voting power in advance using multiple exchange wallets, then submitted a proposal with high-risk execution permissions into the governance process at BonkDAO. BonkDAO later confirmed the details and identified the portions of exchange wallets that had been used to buy BONK before the proposal. External on-chain analysts previously estimated that to obtain enough voting power, the attacker may have spent only around $4 million worth of BONK, yet ultimately drained nearly $20 million from the treasury.
Once the news spread, BONK fell by nearly 10%. Upbit immediately paused BONK deposits and withdrawals, and Kraken also took similar measures. The core goal was to prevent the attacker from moving the stolen funds into centralized platforms and converting them into stablecoins or fiat. BonkDAO has notified law enforcement agencies and is working with exchanges, cross-chain bridges, and the Solana Foundation to track the funds, seek freezes, and recover assets
A proposal called Sowellian BonkDAO—corresponding to Bonk Improvement Proposal #76 —was packaged as a governance reform plan. It proposed replacing members and the committees, rebuilding the DAO, reactivating assets, and also promised to distribute BONK rewards to addresses that vote in favor.
After the proposal passed, about 44 trillion BONK were transferred out of the BonkDAO treasury, valued at roughly $19.3 million to $20 million at the time. The funds flowed to a wallet ending with JHvQ. On-chain tracking shows that this address had previously received financial support from a Bybit account. Later the same day, these tokens were transferred again to another Solana address ending with eh42. As of now, the BONK rewards that were promised to the participants who voted in favor have not been actually distributed.
The attackers did not crack private keys or exploit any disclosed contract vulnerabilities. The attack path occurred at the governance layer. The attackers first accumulated BONK holdings and voting power in advance using multiple exchange wallets, then submitted a proposal with high-risk execution permissions into the governance process at BonkDAO. BonkDAO later confirmed the details and identified the portions of exchange wallets that had been used to buy BONK before the proposal. External on-chain analysts previously estimated that to obtain enough voting power, the attacker may have spent only around $4 million worth of BONK, yet ultimately drained nearly $20 million from the treasury.
Once the news spread, BONK fell by nearly 10%. Upbit immediately paused BONK deposits and withdrawals, and Kraken also took similar measures. The core goal was to prevent the attacker from moving the stolen funds into centralized platforms and converting them into stablecoins or fiat. BonkDAO has notified law enforcement agencies and is working with exchanges, cross-chain bridges, and the Solana Foundation to track the funds, seek freezes, and recover assets
