Summary of the Astar zkEVM Incident Part2-#64 Astar Weekly Journal-

This newsletter will be distributed weekly based on the concept of “an easy weekend recap” of the happenings at Astar Network.

Following last week, I will summarize the Astar zkEVM incident.

The previous issue is also included in this issue, so I hope you can use it to get a rough grasp of the sequence of events.

April 6

- Incidents such as transactions being difficult to process and minted NFTs not appearing on the NFT marketplace occurred.

- Initially, the increase in transactions due to the implementation of the Yoki Origins leaderboard was analyzed as causing RPC issues.

April 7

- The core team announced that an upgrade of Astar zkEVM would take place on April 10.

April 8

- The network issue that started on April 6 continues unresolved.

April 9

- Emergency maintenance is performed separately from the announced upgrade.

- The maintenance is completed, but the network is announced to be unstable as the RPC synchronization is lagging.

April 10

- A report on the series of incidents is posted in the Forum. The content is as follows.

1. On April 6, Astar zkEVM detected a synchronization issue caused by the reorganization (reorg) of Ethereum L1.
2. In response to the issue, the upgrade scheduled for the 10th was implemented ahead of schedule.
3. The network is now operating properly.
4. However, due to the reorg, some transactions and actions on Astar zkEVM from April 6 to 8 may have been nullified.
5. Transactions on the official bridge between Ethereum L1 and Astar zkEVM are being processed correctly, but withdrawals on Ethereum may be delayed as the proofs have not yet been submitted.
6. Third-party bridges (LayerZero, Layerswap, Relay Link) may be affected by the reorg, and investigations are ongoing. Announcements will be made as soon as findings are determined.

- The incident was found to be caused by Polygon’s tech stack. It is announced that Astar will be updated once Polygon’s response is complete. Further responses and analyses of the cause will be announced later.

April 12

- An additional report is posted in the Forum.

1. The issue on Polygon’s side has been resolved, and the network is operating normally.
2. Addresses affected by the reorg will be announced shortly.
3. Asset protection is guaranteed (assets will not be lost).
4. A detailed report will be published by Polygon later.
5. The restart of Yoki Origins is undecided (the schedule will be announced shortly).

April 13

- The restart of Yoki Origins is announced (starting on April 14).

- As compensation for the maintenance period, 12 OMAs are distributed.

April 14

- The Forum publishes the refund status for users who conducted transactions such as ‘Bridge’ and ‘Onlamp’.

1. Bridge: LayerZero/LayerSwap is resolved, but Relay/Owlto is still being addressed.
2. Onlamp: Crossmint has been refunded.

April 15

- Issues occur with on-chain tasks of Yoki Origins (such as DeFi projects), such as Verify and NFT Claim.

April 17

- YoPort, which had been conducting on-chain tasks for Yoki Origins, is temporarily suspended.

April 18

- A review of announcement operations for Japan is announced.

- Announcement channels are created on Discord and Telegram.

- In these channels, the latest information will be broadcasted in Japanese by the core team.

April 19

- Mr. Shaun, CTO of Astar Foundation, posts technical information about the Astar zkEVM incident in the Forum.

1. Due to the use of Exit Trees in the Polygon CDK stack and the impact of the exit root on April 6 (UTC) being affected by reorged block 2 of Ethereum, a discrepancy occurred.
2. In response to the issue, the core development teams of Polygon and Astar decided to upgrade the Astar zkEVM mainnet from Fork ID 7 to Fork ID 9.
3. The issue was resolved through the upgrade and resynchronization operations, but transactions processed between April 6 and April 8 may be affected, and affected transactions will be invalidated.
4. A complete technical root cause analysis by the Polygon Team is scheduled to be published in the Polygon Forum, and will be shared as soon as it is ready.

Going forward

- An RCA report from Polygon is scheduled to be submitted.

- Refund support for some third-party bridges (Relay/Owlto) is planned.

Note

Users who conducted transactions with Bridge and Onlamp and have not had their funds returned should inquire using this form.

Also, as a common inquiry, users who traded NFTs during the relevant period have asked for refunds (compensation for lost opportunities), but these are not eligible for refunds as the transactions themselves did not go through. Please understand this.

That’s all for this week’s news.

Thank you for reading to the end.