An infamous bot operating on the Solana blockchain has reportedly amassed a staggering $30 million in two months, cashing in on an underhanded tactic known as a “MEV sandwich attack”. Such an attack takes place when the bot, in this case, dubbed “arsc”, brackets a user’s transaction with its own pair of deceptive transactions. Through this mechanism, it is able to purchase the user’s tokens at a lesser than market price and subsequently sell it within the same block, exploiting the manufactured price hike for profit.
Founder of cryptocurrency firm MRGN Research, Ben Coverston, explained in a recent post how this particular bot has remained covert in its operation. It has reportedly “gone to great lengths” to elude detection while profiteering from Solana network users.
One of the most substantial addresses associated with the arsc bot, identified as “9973h…zyWp6”, is believed to be predominantly used as cold storage by Coverston. He deduces, “It is quite inactive and, judging by its behavior, is almost certainly a locked-down, cold wallet.” The wallet is said to hold over $19 million in funds, inclusive of $17 million worth of Solana’s SOL tokens and a good $1.1 million in Circle’s USD Coin stablecoin according to Solana explorer site, SolanaFM.