Kelp DAO Disputes LayerZero's Account of $290 Million Exploit, Citing Default Settings as Culprit

A recent cryptocurrency exploit has sparked a heated debate, with Kelp DAO set to challenge LayerZero's post-mortem analysis of the $290 million disaster. According to a source familiar with the matter, Kelp DAO plans to argue that the compromised verifier was actually part of LayerZero's own infrastructure, and that the setup in question was LayerZero's default configuration. The incident occurred when attackers drained 116,500 rsETH, worth approximately $290 million, from Kelp's LayerZero-powered bridge by poisoning the servers that LayerZero's verifier relied on to validate transactions. Kelp DAO claims that the DVN that was compromised was LayerZero's own infrastructure, not a third-party verifier, and that the setup was in line with LayerZero's default settings. The source also contested LayerZero's claim that KelpDAO chose a 1-of-1 DVN setup despite recommendations to configure multi-DVN redundancy, stating that LayerZero's own quickstart guide and default GitHub configuration point to a 1/1 DVN setup. Security researchers have also questioned LayerZero's account, with one expert noting that the reference setup ships with single-source verification defaults across every major chain. The incident has sparked a wider debate about responsibility and the need for greater security measures in the cryptocurrency space.