Shane Cook, the founder of Pulse Digital Marketing, has raised serious concerns about the Shiba Inu team’s handling of the Shibarium Bridge exploit.
Nearly three months have passed since the bridge suffered a devastating hack that drained more than $3 million in user funds. At the time, Shiba Inu developer Kaal Dhairya confirmed the attack and said the team had contacted relevant authorities and blockchain security firms such as PeckShield and Hexens.
Yesterday, on-chain sleuth and Shiba Inu community figure Shima published a detailed breakdown of the hacker’s laundering trail. He traced the flow of funds from the initial exploit wallet through Tornado Cash and ultimately to dozens of KuCoin deposit addresses.
According to Shima’s findings, the hacker laundered 260 ETH through Tornado Cash, with 232.49 ETH eventually landing on KuCoin. His analysis also revealed 111 wallets tied to the laundering process and 45 unique KuCoin deposit addresses.
Although mixers like Tornado Cash rarely expose hidden wallets, Shima confirmed that a single mistake — an accidental transfer of just 0.0874 ETH — linked the hacker’s “secret” wallets and unraveled their entire obfuscation strategy.
After completing the investigation, Shima said he shared the evidence with the Shiba Inu ecosystem team so they could coordinate with law enforcement. Shortly afterward, K9 Finance team member DeFi Turtle contacted KuCoin to request a freeze on the funds.
However, the exchange insisted on a formal law-enforcement case number before taking action. Without this requirement, Shima reported that KuCoin refused to intervene.
Reacting to the report, Pulse Digital Marketing founder Cook questioned why the Shiba Inu team never engaged law enforcement, despite having substantial on-chain evidence that could support an investigation.
The question highlights a growing concern: if the Shiba Inu team truly intends to recover funds or pursue the attacker, why hasn’t a formal complaint been filed? The absence of a law enforcement case number prevented KuCoin from acting on the evidence.
Without a police report, exchanges cannot freeze accounts or release internal data that might help identify money mules or the primary attacker. Shima’s findings make the team’s lack of escalation even more conspicuous.
Despite having an investigative roadmap “handed to them on a silver platter,” according to Shima, the team still did not involve authorities or obtain the case number needed for KuCoin to freeze the stolen assets.
Since the Shiba Inu ecosystem team has not filed an official report, Shima is now urging individual victims to take action themselves. He is offering the complete dataset, methodology, and MetaSleuth mapping to any victim or law enforcement agency willing to pursue the case in their respective countries.
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