Tao Zhu, Golden Finance

Abstract: On June 9, according to monitoring by Specter (@SpecterAnalyst), Humanity Protocol has been hacked, causing losses of more than $31 million. The fund transfer is still in progress, and the attacker is exchanging H for ETH. This article reviews the hacker attack on Humanity Protocol and discusses why there is a lot of speculation about whether the team is pumping and dumping?

Affected by this hacker attack, the price of Humanity’s native token H has plummeted from the previous US$0.71 to around US$0.11 as of press time, a drop of as much as 84.5%.

1. The whole story of Humanity Protocol being stolen

On-chain analyst Specter discovered the attack and reported at 6:04 this morning that more than 17 wallets holding H tokens were emptied.

It appears that wallets associated with or interacted with @Humanityprot are being compromised.

To date, more than 17 wallets holding $H (Humanity Protocol) tokens have been wiped out, with a total loss of more than $5 million.

Theft address:

0x456Cb73b35022E4B524e5510807776453d984AeF

0xee4B6B8967Aa947ac3aEf540eE07ea6099C566F7

0x1dfe5cF3ED5a0AC82FDD0bFCdaC7B6C6323f844a

The root cause is unclear, but patterns suggest the affected wallets may share common exposure risks related to Humanity Protocol.

Stay alert

Two hours later, Humanity Protocol founder Terence Kwok posted on the X platform:

We have detected a security incident involving the exposure of the private key of a Human Foundation member. For security reasons, do not have any interaction with the bridge or any liquidity pool until safety is confirmed.

We have worked with security experts and exchange partners to resolve this issue. We're deeply sorry for this - it's our responsibility to protect our community, and we'll keep you updated on developments.

At 10:06, Humanity official Twitter posted:

We are aware of a security incident involving the private key being compromised by a member of the Humanity Foundation. The safety of our community is our highest priority and we want to be completely transparent about what we know about the situation.

As a precaution, please do not interact with the bridge or any liquidity pools until we issue a security notice. This is the most important step you can take right now to protect your money. We are actively working with leading security experts and our exchange partners to assess the scope of the incident and harden all affected systems.

We are deeply sorry that this incident occurred. Protecting this community is our responsibility, and we don't take it lightly. We will share verified updates as soon as they are available and will not speculate until the facts are confirmed.

Official updates will only come from this account or @terencekwok Please beware of scammers and imposters who take advantage of times like these to scam people. We will never message you privately or ask for your seed phrase or private key first.

At 10:50, Blockaid posted:

The same attacker has now extended the vulnerability on BSC by taking over proxy admin rights for H tokens and minted an additional 100,000,000 H (approximately $12.9 million) to a new wallet.

Minting transaction: 0x5a8f82f1064a7846ab3eb77bd1d36ec52dfd773c3957ad0aeea28da95fe9c5fb

H Token (BSC): 0x44F161aE29361E332dEA039DFA2F404E0bC5B5Cc

Casting operator: 0x6Aa22CB8420E94Fc2119364b4c7885710aE753bB

Funded by the main attacker: 0xAf2a4989922299EB14A29E332dad1012A8aaD3A0

At 12 noon sharp, Onchain Lens posted:

Huminity Protocol hackers have minted 200 million $H and have sold the previously minted 100 million $H for 774 $BNB.

2. Why is it suspected that the team deliberately pumps up and sells goods?

The attitude of followers towards this hacking incident is generally different from previous theft incidents - the first reaction is not to pay attention to the team's trends, but to question whether the team is in Rug?

From Humanity's official post, we can see that most followers are skeptical about this security incident, believing that the team is deliberately raising the price of tokens and seeking personal gain through security incidents.

After the Humanity security incident, ZachXBT took a screenshot and posted a question.

On-chain detective ZachXBT responded to Humanity’s official announcement on social media: It’s time to issue new H tokens, and the team has moved on to other projects. In his reply, ZachXBT used a screenshot of a tweet posted by Irene Zhao 20 hours ago.

Just before the attack, Irene had just posted that she had received a 100-fold return on her investment in H two years ago.

According to public information in the industry, Irene Zhao is one of the core promoters of the Everything ecosystem. Everything belongs to the Humanity Protocol ecological project. In the past two years, Irene's social media, communities, and some public events have often appeared in content such as Everything, Humanity, and Human ID.

With this, the market began to speculate: Did the old investors have already made profits and left the market, so the team directed and acted this Rug?

It should be pointed out that the current evidence on the public chain can only prove that the tokens were abnormally issued and sold. There is no evidence that Irene Zhao or the Humanity team was involved. Relevant discussions mainly stem from speculation at the level of market sentiment.

Under Humanity’s post, many users expressed team Rug’s conjecture:

• User Pikoflip pointed out: So what will the team plan? Even if they realize they've been hacked? Will the supply be destroyed or repurchased?

• User HFSP noted: I think pretending to be a serious company is becoming a trend now. They criminally pumped up the token price, pretended there was a hack (it wasn't, it was intentional), then divided the money among all the criminals, and then the project died. Well done, guys.

• User JennyLau998 pointed out: All on-chain activities seem to indicate that the team has long planned this large-scale rug. All team members should be investigated for fraud and theft.
  

• User Airdrops66 pointed out: It’s hard to believe that after so many years, the same thing keeps happening “accidentally”. This is no accident. This is an existential scam, like every other scam.

• User Khalid Alzandani pointed out: Coai, Bas, Aia, River and now H...we know you guys are pump and dump coins...don't use the same excuse every time...try to say something else instead of a hack.

X users also expressed their gratitude to the team for their quick response.

• User ArunikaLiem pointed out: Transparency is most important in times like this. Thanks to the team for their quick communication and commitment to keeping the community informed. I wish the team success in securing all affected systems and resolving the issue safely.

3. What is Humanity Protocol?

Humanity Protocol is a decentralized digital identity network based on blockchain. The founder of the project is Terence Kwok. Its core goal is to solve problems such as the proliferation of AI robots, witch attacks, fake accounts, and on-chain identity authentication. The core product is Proof of Humanity (PoH).

According to Humanity’s official website: PoH aims to become the world’s largest decentralized open identity graph, which allows users to conduct various transactions, such as declaring their ownership of real-world assets, accessing restricted services, or proving their education and work experience, without disclosing personal information to third parties. Activities such as universal basic income distribution can also be made more equitable because these transactions are tied to real people rather than robots or AI agents.

Humanity uses palm recognition, zero-knowledge proof, and autonomous identity to prove that "you are a real person" without exposing personal privacy. The project has even been called a competitor to Worldcoin by many media outlets. (Note: Worldcoin uses iris scanning, while Humanity Protocol uses palmprint recognition.)

In May 2024, Humanity Protocol announced the completion of a US$30 million seed round of financing, led by Kingsway Capital, with participation from Animoca Brands, Blockchain.com, Hashed, Shima Capital and 20 other industry-leading investment institutions. In January 2025, Humanity Protocol announced the completion of US$20 million in financing, co-led by Pantera Capital and Jump Crypto, with a valuation of US$1.1 billion (fully diluted).

Summary

After the theft incident, the market focused not on whether the team could fix the loopholes and make up for the losses, but on whether it was a team rug. This in itself is a question worth pondering. The biggest risk Humanity faces is actually not the theft itself, but the loss of user trust. Humanity hopes to prove "you are a real person" through the product itself. However, if Humanity cannot prove that it is absolutely safe, how can it prove the identity of hundreds of millions of people around the world?