Phishing victim loses $500K USDC; MEV bot steals $370K in Base Chain attack

HuoXing Finance reports, according to GoPlus monitoring, a user on the Base chain lost 500,000 USDC due to a phishing attack. When the attacker attempted to convert the stolen funds to WETH, their script lacked slippage protection, routing the transaction to a Uniswap V4 WETH/USDC pool with almost no liquidity. As a result, the 500,000 USDC were exchanged for only 67.9 ETH (worth $129,000), with $370,000 siphoned off by MEV bots. The MEV bot front-ran the transaction by paying just 0.03 USDC but incurred a gas fee of 3.5 ETH. Subsequently, the victim sent on-chain messages to both the attacker and the MEV address, claiming to have identified the attacker’s identity and offering a 10% bounty in exchange for a refund.