The Department of Justice unsealed an indictment accusing Andean Medjedovic of exploiting vulnerabilities in two crypto protocols to fraudulently obtain about US$65 million worth of investors’ digital assets, and later conducting transactions designed to conceal the source of the funds. (The Logic)

Talking point: Medjedovic was an 18-year-old in the process of completing a master’s degree in mathematics at the University of Waterloo at the time of the exploit in 2021. Medjedovic allegedly posed as a curious young developer to befriend one of the code maintainers who worked on the crypto protocol before improperly using the information.  He has since gone into hiding; a warrant has been out for his arrest since 2023. The exploit has raised novel legal questions about whether taking advantage of vulnerabilities in a crypto protocol’s code is fraud or just clever programming. Most experts believe it’s the former.