Controversy swirls as the project claims hitmen were hired to target the team, which has a dubious past.<\/p>\n
DeFi investors are seething after gambling platform ZKasino took control of $33 million belonging to its users and staked the ETH in Lido Finance<\/a>.<\/p>\n In the month preceding its launch, ZKasino had enabled a token bridge for users to deposit ETH, in a campaign dubbed \u201cbridge-to-earn.\u201d More than 10,000 users had sent 10,515 ETH, or roughly $33 million, to the bridge, which now showcases<\/a> a \u201c404: This page could not be found\u201d notice.<\/p>\n After going live on April 20, however, users received an unfortunate surprise in a blog post<\/a>; all their deposits had been swapped without their consent to ZKasino\u2019s native token, ZKAS, in what the team called \u201ca favor to our users.\u201d<\/p>\n Notably, the majority of ZKAS was vested with a 15-month lockup period.<\/p>\n But the saga, to the dismay of investors, doesn\u2019t end there. Blockchain sleuths unveiled that the ZKasino team had sent the funds to a multisig address<\/a> controlled by them, and later forwarded the ETH to Lido Finance for staking.<\/p>\n The situation has investors calling it a rug pull as more unsettling news surfaces.<\/p>\n Communication began breaking down<\/a> last Friday, as ZKCasino\u2019s team announced in the Telegram group the chat would be locked for a few hours due to \u201cno moderator [being] available.\u201d<\/p>\n However, during the early hours of Saturday, a team member wrote that the Telegram group had to be shut down \u201cbecause people were hiring hitmen.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo point even unlocking the chat,\u201d said Julian of ZKasino.<\/p>\n Even though ZKasino purported to leverage zkSync and EigenDA, EigenLayer\u2019s<\/a> Data Availability project, it\u2019s come to light that the project didn\u2019t use any zero-knowledge technology at all.<\/p>\n Pseudonymous developer Cygaar wrote on X<\/a> on April 21 that the project does not use either of the aforementioned projects but is instead an Arbitrum-based chain.<\/p>\n \u201cIt’s an Arbitrum Nitro chain that took 2 minutes to deploy,\u201d he said. \u201cThey put ZERO effort into scamming everyone lmao.\u201d<\/p>\n Additionally, ZKasino\u2019s official documents show a smart contract pre-audit conducted by ChatGPT<\/a>, although they claim Certik followed up for a full audit.<\/p>\n The ZKasino team did not immediately reply to a request for comment from The Defiant.<\/p>\n Prominent blockchain detective ZachXBT was among the first to sound the alarm regarding ZKasino\u2019s founding team.<\/p>\n In December 2023, ZachXBT pointed out that the founders were \u201cproven bad actors<\/a>,\u201d posting a number of unpaid debts the team members had incurred.<\/p>\n A lengthy Twitter thread by investor Defizard also backs up ZachXBT\u2019s claims, adding screenshots of the founders calling the situation \u201cFUD and noise.\u201d<\/p>\nTelegram Lockdown<\/h2>\n
False Claims<\/h2>\n
Known Bad Actors<\/h2>\n