ZetaChain Halts Cross-Chain Transactions Following GatewayEVM Contract Attack

Gate News message, April 28 — Layer 1 network ZetaChain paused cross-chain transactions on its mainnet after identifying an attack on the GatewayEVM contract, a smart contract serving as a unified entry point for cross-chain interactions between external EVM-compatible chains and ZetaChain applications.

The incident impacted only internal ZetaChain team wallets. According to DefiLlama data, $300,000 was lost in the attack, though the team did not disclose the amount and said it will release a detailed post-mortem. The team confirmed that no user funds were affected and has mitigated the attack vector to prevent further compromise.

“As a precaution, cross-chain transactions are currently paused on ZetaChain,” the team stated. “Investigation is still ongoing.” According to ZetaChain’s official status page, cross-chain transactions remained paused as of Monday evening, nine hours after the attack was identified.

ZetaChain is an interoperability-focused Layer 1 network designed as the “first universal blockchain” integrating Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Polygon. The incident follows the recent Kelp DAO exploit, which drained $292 million and prompted an industry-wide coalition called “DeFi United” to rescue decentralized liquidity protocols.