The ZK token saw a large fall of 17% within 30 minutes on April 15, 2025, which was a result of a security issue that saw a hacker take over about $5 million in unclaimed tokens from the ZKSync airdrop. This played out to be very turbulent in the crypto space as traders reacted to the news.
Exploit Details and Immediate Impact
According to reports, the security breach came from a broken admin account which the attacker used to create 110 million ZK tokens from the airdrop contract. The hacker put up for sale 66 million of these tokens which caused the price to drop from $0.0478 to $0.0396 immediately.
The ZKSync team reported that while user funds were secure the exploit did play out in the airdrop contract which did not affect the core protocol. We saw right away emergency measures put in place and a full-scale investigation which is still going on.
Market Reaction
After the exploit, the ZK token saw very large price fluctuations. Also, we saw a great increase in trading volume which added to market panic. As the Relative Volatility Index (RVI) went from 18.68 to 72.81 market sentiment went very bearish which in turn created more worry among traders.
Even after a small recovery to $0.0441, trader confidence did not return which is a reflection of the large issue of security in crypto systems. The immediate market reaction brings to light the very fragile state of confidence in crypto ecosystems in which security breaches play out.
Community Frustrations and Criticisms
This incident has brought up great discontent in the ZKSync community. Critics are frustrated with the airdrop rollout and what they see as unfair token distribution at the initial launch. Additionally, we see analysts drawing comparisons to other projects which had very serious collapses after similar exploit incidents which questions the operation integrity of ZKSync.
Some community members like the pseudonymous commentator Hanky Pym have put forth that ZKSync’s story is that of other projects which had large-scale failures. Also, we see skepticism around the truth of the exploit which some put forth may have been a ploy to cover up other improper doings.
Previous Controversies Surrounding ZKSync
This security breach adds to the ongoing concerns surrounding ZKSync, especially regarding its controversial airdrop from June 2024. Critics have highlighted the uneven distribution, where over half of the tokens went to less than 1% of participants.
Additionally, issues arose with Sybil attacks, as some users manipulated the system to receive disproportionate airdrop rewards.
As ZKSync sets out to do a full-scale investigation into what went wrong and put in place better security measures, the company’s future in the eyes of the public is in that report’s results which will also determine the community’s trust back in the project.
