"Don't interfere, it will swallow you" - ForkLog: cryptocurrencies, AI, singularity, the future

# “Don’t interfere, it will eat you”

A personal but typical story of one of many failures in DeFi

A regular ForkLog reader and experienced crypto market participant — about how I lost funds and, at the same time, hope to recover them.

We often repeat like a mantra: “Even the most experienced crypto investors are not immune to mistakes.” Of course, this is pure truth. But is it normal if the industry claims to be a mainstream alternative to traditional finance?

The answer to this question is negative from a regular ForkLog reader and author, who wished to remain anonymous today.

“Sorry, we can’t help”

I had a significant amount stolen in stablecoins from wallets after a hack of Aperture Finance. Through this platform, I added liquidity to PancakeSwap, which required approving unlimited spending of USDT. The hacker found a vulnerability in the contracts and, through permission, was able to withdraw all tokens from user wallets. There are technical analyses of the incident here and here.

Trying to find help to recover at least some funds, I realized that the industry still simply cannot fight hackers. After so much time since the creation of Bitcoin, Ethereum, 20,000 L2 solutions, 30,000 smart contract platforms, developers have not learned the main thing — how to protect their users.

Immediately after the theft, I contacted Tether for help, since they are the issuer of USDT. We see news every day about token blocks related to thefts, hacks, and illegal activities, but apparently, they do not concern standard incidents like mine. I received this response:

“Sorry, we can’t help. We do not issue USDT on BNB Chain.”

Okay, I know who issues it. I reached out to the exchange. Surely they have tools for transaction tracking, I thought. They probably use all existing tools worldwide. You can create a cluster of related addresses, trace where the stolen tokens went, find an exit to a centralized platform with KYC. The hacker will eventually need to cash out, right? Then send a request to freeze the account. There is proof of theft.

“Sorry, we can’t help. According to our data, the tokens haven’t reached us,” was the reply.

Of course, they haven’t. They are still sitting in the hacker’s wallet. I didn’t ask them to block USDT at the address — the answer would be obvious.

“The best solution is to contact law enforcement. They have the resources and legal authority to investigate such complex cases and find the culprits. Provide them with a link to the official request form,” the exchange representatives wrote, sending a URL for the official appeal.

I turned to authorities because I had heard about cyber police, trained by leading blockchain security firms to track transactions. Those guys initially recorded hacker addresses on a piece of paper (for some reason, transaction hashes were no longer recorded). Then I had to explain three times what happened. In the end, they said:

“You’re more knowledgeable about these issues. Do your thing, and we’re ready to help if needed. We can put some stamp on it.”

Aperture Finance developers have been silent for two weeks. They announced they were hacked, and then silence. I assume they have no funds to compensate victims.

As a result, after the hack of Aperture Finance (if it was a hack and not a backdoor left by the team itself and subsequent theft) and two weeks of ignoring the issue, everything indicates that the project has ceased development and existence, several million dollars stolen from various people, and the hacker is satisfied and has left untouched.

Everyone sees the addresses where tokens are stored, and no one can do anything. There is no authority that can help, and nobody cares.

Not your keys — not your coins

We, crypto users, declare the industry’s main advantage as full control over our funds. But it is also the main flaw of digital assets. How does the industry plan to achieve mass adoption if anyone can find a vulnerability in three lines of code, steal funds directly from wallets, and face no consequences?

It’s even worse than phone scammers. They require victims to take actions — sell an apartment, send funds, provide CVV. In crypto, tokens can disappear while you sleep, due to permissions granted three years ago, because old contracts have a new vulnerability.

Yes, I understand that everyone is responsible for their own security. We all know the rules:

1. Regularly review permissions.
2. Change wallets.
3. Don’t use unverified services.
4. Don’t click links from Google.
5. Don’t copy addresses from transaction history.
6. Don’t fall for scams like “Elon Musk gives away 1 BTC, just send 0.1 BTC to this wallet.”

And so on, and so forth. Are there too many rules? The industry promises people decentralized finance where “you own your assets.” But does it offer proper protection?

Why can’t tools be created for fund recovery after theft? To prevent it? Submit a fraud report to nodes —> provide proof —> they vote to freeze —> then, based on a decentralized court decision, funds are returned.

Only in January 2026, hackers hacked 16 projects and stole $86.01 million.

Source: PeckShieldAlert. Who will be interested in cryptocurrencies if there are so many unknowns? Try suggesting to your friend to put USDT on Aave instead of dollars in a bank and describe all the risks:

• USDT could be frozen (but not when it’s stolen from you);
• Aave could be hacked and everything stolen;
• You might accidentally click the wrong link, and everything will be withdrawn;
• USDT could depeg.

Sandwich attacks, fraudulent tokens, volume manipulations to create the illusion of a token’s attractiveness. These are our realities, with which we live and pretend everything is fine.

And there are fake USDT too. You might sell, for example, a Telegram channel, and get not real stablecoins but scam tokens. You need to be able to verify them by contract address.

Who will want to use digital assets after knowing all this?

When friends ask me to teach them how to earn on farming (because they see someone pressing three buttons on a laptop and making money while playing FIFA), I always want to give just one piece of advice: don’t interfere, it will eat you.

The entire DeFi industry, as it was five or six years ago, remains complex, inconvenient, unsafe, and uninteresting to the mass market. An experienced crypto enthusiast might find market inefficiencies and earning opportunities here, but for the vast majority, it’s far from “a bank in everyone’s pocket.”

The safest and still the only way to use cryptocurrencies is to buy Bitcoin, store it on a hardware wallet, and not touch it. As soon as you start thinking, “They’re just sitting idle, I should collateralize/transfer and earn,” a slow-burn bomb is set. Sooner or later, the mistake will catch up.