Pump Science Warns Against Fraudulent Tokens After Private Key Compromise

The impressive momentum behind Pump Science, a decentralized science project, may have hit a roadblock after the project suffered an exploit.

On Nov. 26, Pump Science announced that its profile on the booming token launchpad, PumpFun, and the offchain wallet associated with its Pump Fun profile had been compromised, allowing a “known attacker” to launch fraudulent tokens using the official Pump Science profile.

“Do not trust any new tokens launched from the pscience PumpFun profile,” Pump Science said. “These were not created by our team and this wallet is compromised.”

Pump Science told The Defiant that the attack was the result of its development team mistakenly publishing the private key to its off chain developer wallet in the project's GitHub.

"This resulted in the ability for an attacker to launch fraudulent tokens associated with the Pump Science profile, making it appear as though the tokens were legitimate because they were showcased alongside the project's official tokens URO and RIF," Pump Science said.

As such, an attacker can launch new tokens from the project’s original wallet at any time.

The project changed the profiled name from “pscience” to “dont_trust” in a bid to warn PumpFun users. It also partnered with Blockaid, an on-chain security platform, to flag any new tokens minted by the address with a warning rolled out to transaction and token scanning APIs.

Pump Science said it will not release any new tokens until after multiple consultative audits, an open competitive audit with Code4rena, and penetration testing have been completed. They will also launch a bug bounty program.

Pump Science was announced in September, with the platform seeking to combine memecoins with longevity research. Users can launch tokens via PumpFun to fund research into “longevity research” involving drugs and chemical compounds through memecoins launched on the platform.

“To fund the experiment for a particular intervention, drug devs launch a token, which represents fractional rights to the cocktail, and is sold to pay for the experiments,” Pump Science said. “The rights to the interventions developed on the platform can be licensed, and the interventions sold as supplements or research chemicals.”

The project attracted attention last week after its RIF and URO tokens surged to nine-figure market caps.