Andean” Andy” Medjedovic, a 22- time-old Canadian man, is facing serious felonious charges in the U.S. after allegedly orchestrating two major decentralized finance( DeFi) hacks that inclusively stole$ 65 million in cryptocurrencies. Medjedovic is accused of masterminding the 2021 listed Finance exploit and the 2023 KyberSwap hack. Known for the cybercrime involving the KyberSwap attack, Medjedovic had also confessed to his part in the listed Finance hack some time back when he was still a teenager and had run off with a whopping quantum of$ 16 million.
The Daring Hacker- He Who Did Not Hide His Identity
What makes Medjedovic’s case interesting is that he did n’t go to any great extent to hide his identity. Indeed, he sounded indeed proud of doing so. Medjedovic went public to justify his conduct because he did not suppose what he was doing was illegal. Among the reasons cited (Canadian) was this” law is law” gospel which some DeFi hackers subscribe to. According to Medjedovic, he is not breaking legal rules but rather exploiting vulnerabilities in the law itself. In substance, he argued that if the law allowed for exploitation, it was not his fault he was simply taking advantage of the loophole.
This is an analogous argument to that made by Avraham” Avi” Eisenberg, another DeFi hacker, who made captions in 2022 with the Canadian requests exploit, siphoning off$ 110 million. Eisenberg defended his conduct, saying he was simply exploiting the system, which was not fraud. Still, a New York jury did not partake in this sense and condemned Eisenberg for fraud and request manipulation. He’s awaiting sentencing and can face up to 20 times in captivity. The case serves as a reminder that while hackers may justify their conduct as following the law, the legal system does not interpret it the same way.
Although Medjedovic believes that his conduct wasn’t illegal, the verity is that hacking and stealing from decentralized systems have serious consequences, and it appears that Medjedovic is now reaping the fruits of his labor.
On the Run Medjedovic’s Flight and Public Statements
Following the listed Finance hack, Medjedovic was not arrested. In fact, by December 2021, a Canadian court had issued an arrest leave against him, but also Medjedovic was formerly underground. Life as a fugitive could hardly be called glamorous.” It was veritably exhausting,” Medjedovic said in an interview with a DeFi Llama intelligencer in 2023. He said he’d passed across the utmost of Europe, South America, and indeed through an islet nation whose name he did not wish to mention in a shot to go undetected.
After being declared a fugitive, Medjedovic still expressed himself intimately about his conditioning. In the same interview, he asserted that he was a” whitehat” hacker, who used computer hacking for ethical reasons, similar to discovering and repairing security holes. This redemption admission sounded to be transferring a communication that he was trying to rebrand himself as a good actor in the hacker community. But within eight months in Canadian after this redemption, he shared in the KyberSwap hack, which makes it delicate for his redeeming tale to be trusted.
KyberSwap Hack A Completely Planned Operation
It has been reported that Medjedovic shared in the KyberSwap hack in 2023. The hack of KyberSwap seems like a largely planned operation by Medjedovic. According to the charge, this was n’t a spur- of- the- moment decision. In fact, Medjedovic reportedly spent several months strictly planning the hack, strategizing every step of the process. He did not just jump into the attack without medication — he planned every detail in advance. Medjedovic indeed made particular notes, similar to “Find time to Strike! and created a”POST-EXPLOITATION” plan for himself to follow once the hack was complete. One of the most satisfying aspects of Medjedovic’s mindset during this period was his reflection on his once conduct and miscalculations.
