Uniswap DAO debate shows devs still struggle to secure cross-chain bridges
Developers face tradeoffs between making bridges upgradeable to fix bugs versus making them decentralized. Over $2.5 billion was stolen in cross-chain crypto bridge hacks from 2021 to 2022, according to a report by Token Terminal. But, despite several attempts by developers to improve bridge security, a debate from December 2022 to January 2023 on the Uniswap DAO forums has laid bare security weaknesses that continue to exist in blockchain bridges. In the past, bridges like Ronin and Horizon used multisig wallets to ensure that only bridge validators could authorize withdrawals. For example, Ronin required five out of nine signatures to withdraw, whereas Horizon required two out of five. But attackers figured out how to circumvent these systems and withdrew millions of dollars worth of crypto, leaving users of these bridges with unbacked tokens. After these multisig bridges were hacked, developers started turning to more sophisticated protocols like Celer, LayerZero and Wormhole, whic...