Harmony has proposed shutting down its seven-year-old layer-1 blockchain and migrating its native ONE token to Ethereum as an ERC-20 asset. The project cited overwhelming security threats from state-sponsored actors and AI agents, following a devastating August 2026 exploit that forged over 3 trillion ONE tokens. Harmony has set aside a $1.372 million compensation pool for validators who shut down their nodes starting September 10, 2026, as the team pivots to an AI video venture.
Harmony blockchain shutdown proposal
- ▪The Harmony shutdown proposal is non-binding, and the project has not specified a date for the final block or confirmed if it will undergo the validator-led governance process.
- ▪Harmony proposed retiring its seven-year-old layer-1 blockchain, migrating its native ONE token to Ethereum as an ERC-20 asset, and transitioning to an AI video business.
State-sponsored security threats
- ▪The Federal Bureau of Investigation attributed the June 2022 Horizon Bridge hack, which drained approximately $100 million from Harmony, to North Korea's Lazarus Group and APT38.
- ▪Harmony cited overwhelming security threats from state-sponsored actors and artificial intelligence agents as the primary reason for sunsetting its independent blockchain.
AI agent vulnerabilities
- ▪An Anthropic study on 832 banned cybercrime accounts showed that accounts rated medium risk or higher increased from 33% to 56% over the course of the study.
- ▪OpenAI claims that its GPT-6 Astra model has attained "Critical" cybersecurity capabilities, demonstrating rapid vulnerability discovery and exploitation in computer programs.
August exploit forged tokens
- ▪In August 2026, an exploit in Harmony's cross-shard receipt verification system allowed an attacker to fraudulently mint over 3 trillion ONE tokens across six transactions.
- ▪Harmony responded to the August 2026 exploit by proposing a blockchain rollback to an August 11 checkpoint, discarding 109,126 regular transactions and 315 staking transactions.
ONE migration to Ethereum
- ▪Multisig safes, liquidity pools, and on-chain applications cannot be migrated to Ethereum, prompting Harmony to urge users to exit all smart contracts before September 10, 2026.
- ▪Harmony plans to record ONE balances at the final block via a network snapshot and automatically airdrop the new ERC-20 tokens to the same addresses on Ethereum.
Validator compensation pool
- ▪Validators can begin shutting down their Harmony nodes starting at 7:00 a.m. Pacific time on September 10, 2026.
- ▪Harmony set aside a $1.372 million compensation pool for validators and delegators who shut down their nodes on time, sign an agreement, and remain as governors.
Debatable claims
- ▪Harmony's network rollback to erase exploit transactions is justified
- ▪AI-driven cyber threats make independent layer-1 blockchains unsustainable
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