Drift Investors sue Circle after $280M hack
The company is accused of failing to freeze stolen funds in time.
17.04.2026 - 09:45
337
2 min
0
Key points:
- After the $280 million Drift Protocol hack, investors filed a class-action lawsuit against Circle.
- The company is accused of failing to freeze stolen USDC despite having the ability to do so.
Circle is facing a class-action lawsuit from Drift Protocol investors who lost funds in the April 1 hack—one of the largest incidents in DeFi history.
The lawsuit, filed by law firm Gibbs Mura, alleges that Circle failed to act quickly to freeze stolen USDC, even though it had the technical capability.
According to the plaintiffs, the company could have intervened but chose not to.
Major Solana hack: Drift suspends operations
Here’s how the attack unfolded and where the funds were moved.
On-chain analyst ZachXBT also criticized Circle. He claims the company had roughly six hours to freeze the assets. During that time, the attacker reportedly moved over $230 million in USDC from Solana to Ethereum.
The lawsuit also points out that Circle has previously frozen wallets in other cases, which, according to the plaintiffs, demonstrates its ability to act.
Debate Over Freezing Funds
Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire said the company operates strictly within the law and only freezes wallets upon requests from courts or law enforcement.
He warned that taking independent action without legal authorization could create serious risks and raise ethical concerns.
At the time of publication, Circle had not commented on the lawsuit.
Meanwhile, Drift said it has received compensation offers, including up to $127.5 million from Tether and another $20 million from partners. The funds are expected to help cover user losses and support the platform’s recovery.
Useful material?
Telegram 
Twitter Incidents
The Digital Crime Task Force will look for suspicious transfers on the Tron network and help police freeze funds before they are moved out.
Nov 12, 2026
Incidents
In a single week, hackers went after PHP websites, the Railway cloud platform and a medical company, and experts started talking about a crisis that is only just beginning.
Oct 28, 2026
Incidents
In 104 minutes, the attacker emptied 1,404 addresses before validators halted the network and froze almost all of the loot.
Oct 19, 2026
Incidents
Developers warned of potential risks to bridges across the ecosystem and asked exchanges for assistance.
Jun 22, 2026
Incidents
The defendant helped move funds stolen through investment scams and earned at least $4 million for his role in the operation.
Jun 10, 2026
Incidents
The company is linking the incident to a compromised private key on a service wallet, rather than a smart contract exploit
May 22, 2026
Cryptocurrency rates
-
Bitcoin
$71 355
BTC
-3.63%
-
Ethereum
$2 010.39
ETH
-2.26%
-
Ripple
$1.42
XRP
+1.04%
-
BNB Smart Chain
$653.21
BSC
-4.19%
-
TRON
$0.31529
TRX
-0.57%
-
Zcash
$944.44
ZEC
-3.86%
-
Dogecoin
$0.066187
DOGE
-2.05%
-
Cardano
$0.218269
ADA
+2.11%
-
Stellar XLM
$0.184461
XLM
+2.83%
-
Polkadot
$3.32
DOT
+5.27%