STEPN was subjected to a disrupted DDoS attack

The STEPN project team reported a cyber attack that led to a temporary system failure and erroneous removal of users from the platform as bots.

Service representatives warned users that the M2E application, which allows users to earn cryptocurrencies and NFTs through activities in the real world, was at risk:

“Over the past hours, we have been subjected to many DDOS attacks. Server protection and recovery can take from one to 12 hours. We recommend that you take some rest during maintenance, otherwise your workouts may not be recorded correctly.”

The team assured that they are working on fixing the problem:

“Our engineers are working hard to fix the problems. We’ll let you know as soon as the restoration is complete.”

The attack took place the day after the June 4 team informed on Twitter about the introduction of “anti-cheating infrastructure” into the gaming platform. The project explained the decision by the measures taken against the rapid growth in the number of users. Such growth is a major challenge for blockchain games with a “play to earn” (P2E, Pay-to-Earn) business model.

The developers have noticed that some players are using bots and GPS spoofing to increase the amount of tokens generated by the application. STEPN acknowledged that after a system update that resulted in many hours of platform downtime, some runners were identified as bots by the new system.

This happened as a result of 25 million DDOS attacks sent to the server in a short period of time. Some users have been removed from the platform. STEPN assured that the network has been restored, “data transmission has resumed and remains stable”, and users no longer have to worry about being labeled as bots again.

Recently, members of the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) community suffered an attack by intruders who infiltrated a Discord channel through a PR account. Hackers managed to steal $340,000 worth of NFTs.