ZKSync Airdrop: The Good, the Bad, and the Bots

June 22, 2024

### ZKSync Airdrop: The Good, the Bad, and a Huge Botnet

Hey everyone! Let’s talk about the recent zkSync airdrop and what went down. They had strict rules to weed out Sybil attackers (those sneaky folks using multiple wallets to exploit airdrops), but it turns out, they still missed a lot of bots. Here’s a quick breakdown.

#### What Happened with the Airdrop?

zkSync aimed to make their airdrop fair and prevent Sybil attacks. They used two main strategies:
1. **CEX Deposit Address Reuse**: They looked at wallets that sent crypto to the same centralized exchange address over a year.
2. **Common Funding Patterns**: They checked if multiple wallets were funded in a similar way within a set time.

Combining these methods, they filtered out large clusters of wallets (specifically more than 20 controlled by the same entity). However, it didn’t completely work as planned.

#### The Big Miss

Despite their efforts, some bots slipped through. One notable case was an airdrop hunter who pocketed 3.01 million ZK tokens (worth around $753,000) using 85 different wallets! This person swiftly moved 2.71 million ZK tokens to Binance and sold 300K through SyncSwap, walking away with a tidy sum. (Source: [onchain data](https://era.zksync.network/address/0xe8308e5894917c6b9c1b2111448f6e61f3a7b914#tokentxns))

#### Criticism from the Community

Many folks in the crypto space weren’t impressed. Adam Cochran from Cinneamhain Ventures pointed out that the criteria used were too easy for bots to meet and too tough for genuine users. He wasn’t alone in this view, as many echoed concerns about the distribution process potentially leading to market instability due to massive token sell-offs.

Cochran stressed the need for better planning to avoid these “turbo-dumping” scenarios. Essentially, a stronger anti-Sybil program is essential to avoid these pitfalls.

### The Takeaway

zkSync’s airdrop shows that even with decent planning, stopping all bots is like a cat mouse race - almost impossoble. For future airdrops, I expect more rigorous checks that could help in achieving fairer distribution and protecting genuine users.

Stay tuned for more updates, and let’s hope the next round of airdrops manages to dodge the bots better. Until next time!

Feel free to share your thoughts on our reddit: [r/AirdropScan](https://www.reddit.com/r/AirdropScan/)

ps: 20% of people forget to claim their airdrops, but you can get Free Wallet Alerts here 😉