Binance, Polymarket seek Polygon hard fork to recover $6.8M in stolen crypto

Polygon block producers have frozen stolen tokens, but a hard fork is proposed to recover and return the funds to their rightful owners. Binance and Polymarket have proposed a hard fork on the Polygon network to recover around 70.49 million POL tokens, valued at approximately $6.8 million, stolen in separate security incidents. The recovery would involve recovering 23.86 million POL, worth $2.31 million, linked to four addresses in Polymarket's hack and 46.63 million POL, worth $4.51 million, associated with one address in the Binance hack.

The plan involves removing the stolen tokens from the five attacker-controlled addresses and transferring them to verified recovery wallets designated by both platforms. The hard fork would occur at a predetermined block without altering POL's total supply. Polygon block producers have already blocked transactions from affected addresses, but this is a temporary measure that cannot directly return the funds to their owners.

The proposal requires governance approval and testing on Polygon's Amoy testnet before activation, with a scheduled discussion on November 5, followed by a potential date for the mainnet hard fork. This proposal comes in the wake of Binance's $6.3 billion hack on October 29 and Polymarket's temporary trading suspension due to a compromised third-party provider.