Polymarket resumes trading after the hack and promises to reimburse losses

Prediction market Polymarket has brought its international platform back online after a cyberattack, the company officially confirmed the incident on X.

According to it, the issue has already been identified and fixed. All affected traders have been promised full compensation for their losses.

In its statement, Polymarket clarified that the vulnerability was not on the exchange itself but at one of its third-party service providers. "We've identified & fixed an issue impacting our international platform, Polymarket.com. One of our 3rd party providers was compromised, and we have referred this to relevant law enforcement," the platform's message reads. The company added that it had referred the incident to law enforcement and that no one affected would be left out of pocket: "Anyone who has been impacted will be made whole."

As Polymarket explained, the platform was stopped "out of an abundance of caution" while the investigation and recovery were underway, after which the company announced it was coming back online. By its account, trading resumed at approximately 3pm Eastern Time, just a few hours after the halt.

This is the same incident in which, by analysts' estimates, around 700 users were affected and some 2.7 million dollars was stolen. Importantly, the attack hit only Polymarket's flagship international platform, which is built on cryptocurrency, and did not touch Polymarket US, a separate, federally regulated financial exchange for American users.

The swift recovery and the promise of compensation should soften the reputational blow, but the episode once again highlighted the vulnerability of crypto infrastructure, including through third-party contractors. For Polymarket, which is enjoying a financial surge after raising 1 billion dollars and reaching a 21 billion dollar valuation, a quick return to operation and a readiness to cover traders' losses look like an attempt to preserve the audience's trust against the backdrop of an already difficult security track record.