deBridge founder urges Flow validators to halt activity after a $3.9 million exploit, citing doubled balances, coordination gaps, and a 40% FLOW price drop.
deBridge founder Alex Smirnov has urged Flow validators to halt transaction processing after a controversial blockchain rollback. The call comes after worrying about user losses and disruption of the ecosystem. In the meantime, the Flow Foundation is under increasing pressure to put forward a clear remediation framework.
Flow Rollback Controversy Intensifies After $3.9 Million Exploit
The Flow blockchain rollback was pursuant to an exploit of $3.9 million on December 27, 2025. As people said, an attacker used a vulnerability in the execution layer of Flow. As a result, money was stolen off-chain by various cross-chain bridges.
Flow Foundation began the rollback in order to undo the impact of the exploit. The decision was, however, a fast trigger of criticism within the validator and developer community. The critics comment that the reaction was not coordinated, and it brought about wider systemic risks.
Alex Smirnov asked the validators to stop node operations. He encouraged validators to cease to validate transactions on the reverted chain. Thus, the user protection was emphasized by Smirnov until a compensation plan is completed.
Related Reading: Flow Blockchain Prepares Full Restart After $3.9M Bridge Exploit | Live Bitcoin News
deBridge is one of the main bridge providers of Flow. The rollback that Smirnoff had developed cautioned users who bridged assets out of doubled balances. On the other hand, users who deposited assets into Flow can have losses that can never be recovered.
Smirnov claimed that the rollback occurred in legitimate transactions over a small period of time. In particular, the transactions between 11: 25 PM PST on the 26th of December and 5: 30 AM PST on the 27th of December were affected. Consequently, financial damages may be even greater than the initial 3.9 million exploit.
Validators were not in a position to stop work at once, despite the request of the population. Flowscan data indicates that the network stopped at a block height of 137,385,824. Interestingly, the chain was still stuck at 11:24 PM UTC on Saturday.
FLOW Price Drops Over 40% as Network Enters Read-Only Mode
Flow Foundation later reported that the network had gone into a read-only state. This was to enable balances to be synchronized safely in exchanges and bridges. In the meantime, validation activity was held back in order to avoid inconsistencies.
Smirnov offered other reactions to the accident. He proposed a focused hard fork instead of a complete rollback. Also, blacklisting of addresses of attackers was suggested to seclude malice.
The same worries were voiced by the representatives of LayerZero on social media. They cautioned that complete reversals of ledgers discredit the finality of the transactions. Therefore, critics and maintenance experts believe that targeted fixes do not undermine the credibility of a network in the long-term.
The reaction of the market on the incident was instant. After the exploit and rollback, the price of FLOW token went down drastically. According to CoinGecko, FLOW has fallen over 40 percent in a few days.
Investors expressed doubts over balances and governance decisions. Thus, the confidence of the retail and institutional participants weakened. Volatility also increased, and trading volumes also spiked.
Flow Foundation has indicated that it is in the process of developing a remediation and compensation plan. Officials said they would update them when coordination is made. Nonetheless, no clear schedule has been announced.
The incident has brought back the question of blockchain immutability. Rollbacks contradict the principles of decentralization even though they provide temporary protection. Therefore, the Flow case can have an impact on the crisis responses among blockchain networks in the future.
Source: https://www.livebitcoinnews.com/debridge-founder-calls-for-flow-validators-to-halt-network-after-rollback/
