ChainThink report, May 15: According to Foresight News, the Kelp DAO cross-chain bridge was attacked by North Korea's Lazarus Group on April 18, resulting in losses of approximately $292 million. The Arbitrum Security Council has frozen 30,766 ETH belonging to the attacker, valued at around $71 million.

Four weeks after the theft, rsETH withdrawal functionality resumed; however, the frozen ETH has become embroiled in a dispute over ownership due to its involvement in a U.S. terrorism compensation litigation against North Korea.

New York Southern District Federal Court Judge Margaret Garnett has intervened twice in this dispute. On May 9, she modified the injunction to allow the Arbitrum DAO to transfer the frozen ETH into an Aave-controlled wallet via on-chain governance voting;

On May 14, the judge postponed the scheduled emergency hearing to June 5 and required Aave and Gerstein Harrow, counsel representing families of anti-terrorism victims, to submit additional legal documentation by May 22.

Gerstein Harrow represents three groups of families holding unenforced anti-terrorism judgments against North Korea, arguing that the ETH constitutes North Korean state assets and should be used for compensating victims of terrorism.

On-chain investigators such as ZachXBT and security researcher Taylor Monahan criticized the move, asserting that Aave users are the actual victims of this attack, and that legal intervention risks delaying the recovery of funds.

Aave launched an on-chain vote on May 12 to transfer 30,765 ETH into the Aave Recovery Guardian multisig wallet; the vote is expected to take approximately eight days to complete.

Kelp DAO has restored rsETH withdrawals, cross-chain bridging, and EigenLayer staking functionalities. The forged rsETH supply created by the attacker was fully liquidated and destroyed by May 7.

Additionally, Aave Labs is proposing a restructuring of its bug bounty program, with the maximum reward for critical vulnerabilities in core Aave V3 increased to $5 million. The ultimate disposition of the $71 million in ETH remains pending the outcome of the federal court hearing scheduled for June 5.