ZetaChain Halts Cross-Chain Transactions amid Contract Attack

• ZetaChain paused mainnet cross-chain transfers after its GatewayEVM contract was attacked.
• The team said only internal wallets were affected, with no user funds impacted.
• The exploit was due to missing access controls in the GatewayEVM contract call function.

ZetaChain paused cross-chain transactions on mainnet after an attack hit its GatewayEVM contract. The team said the incident affected only internal ZetaChain team wallets. No user funds were impacted. The attack path has been blocked, and further losses are not expected.

Cross-chain transfers remain paused while the investigation continues. ZetaChain said a full post-mortem will be released after the review is complete.

Attack Hit GatewayEVM Contract

GatewayEVM is the contract layer that connects external EVM chains with apps running on ZetaChain. It acts as the entry point for cross-chain actions between networks. Because of that role, any weakness in the contract can affect asset movement across chains.

Blockchain security firm SlowMist said early findings point to a vulnerability in the call function of the GatewayZEVM contract. According to the analysis, the function lacked proper access control and input checks, which allowed any user to trigger malicious cross-chain calls.

Those calls were then picked up by the relayer system and executed on target chains, giving the attacker a route to drain funds. ZetaChain has not yet confirmed SlowMist’s findings in its own final report.

It is important to note that ZetaChain did not disclose the value lost in the exploit. Some sources estimate losses at roughly $300,000.

The team said only internal wallets were affected, which limits direct user exposure. However, the pause on cross-chain transfers temporarily disrupts one of the network’s core functions.

ZETA Token Trades Lower

The ZETA token fell after the incident. CoinMarketCap data shows ZETA near $0.054 at press time, down about 4.8% over 24 hours. The token traded within a range of roughly $0.053 to $0.059 during that period.

Price weakness often follows bridge or contract incidents as traders reduce risk until technical clarity returns. It has a volume of $7.84M, a decline of more than 30%, and has a market cap of $73.99M.

ZetaChain markets itself as an interoperability-focused Layer 1 built to connect networks such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Polygon. Its mainnet launched in early 2024.

Related: Two Hacks, $606M Lost, Yet Ethereum Holds Above $2,300