Catenaa, Tuesday, December 30, 2025-The Flow blockchain is planning to roll back its transaction history to a checkpoint before a $3.9 million exploit on Friday, but the decision has drawn criticism from ecosystem partners for lack of coordination.
Cross-chain bridge operators and exchanges said they were blindsided by the planned rollback, raising concerns over potential losses for users and service providers.
DeBridge, a major bridge provider, reported it received no prior notice before the rollback decision and warned the move could harm innocent users while leaving the attacker unaffected.
LayerZero, another protocol, supports deBridge’s recommendation for a targeted hard fork to fix the vulnerability and blacklist illicit funds rather than reversing the entire ledger.
The Flow Foundation confirmed the exploit occurred in the network’s execution layer, allowing the attacker to mint FLOW tokens and bridged assets such as WBTC, WETH, and stablecoins.
The team initially planned to restore the network to a pre-exploit checkpoint, requiring affected transactions to be resubmitted. A technical post-mortem is expected within 72 hours.
The announcement caused the FLOW token to drop more than 40%, falling from $0.17 to a low of $0.079 before stabilizing around $0.10. South Korean exchanges Upbit, Bithumb, and Coinone suspended deposits and withdrawals, while the Digital Asset Exchange Alliance issued a transaction risk warning.
The Flow Foundation acknowledged feedback from partners and said it would take additional time to ensure broad alignment before resuming operations.
Analysts and ecosystem participants stress that improved coordination is essential to prevent cascading losses and preserve trust in the network.
