Aptos offers US$1 mln bug bounty for catching critical vulnerabilities

Aptos, a public chain launched by former members of failed Meta stablecoin project Diem, announced Friday a prize of up to US$1 million to encourage developers to find major vulnerabilities in the blockchain network, as the launch of the highly-anticipated blockchain fell slightly behind schedule.

See related article: Binance makes additional investment in Aptos 

Fast facts

• The bounty program applies to six vulnerabilities in the blockchain and should fall on the “critical” rating — which can cause severe blockchain network downtime, damage and fund loss.

• Aptos said the bounty program is open to individuals from regions outside of U.S. Treasury sanctioned countries, which excludes countries such as Russia, Iran and North Korea.

• Aptos was cofounded by Mo Shaikh and Avery Ching, both former members of the Meta (formerly Facebook) Diem stablecoin project, which was nearing completion but halted due to regulatory concerns before going live.

• Aptos was touted as a “Solana killer” — with the coding language “Move” created for Diem, it claimed it will be the fastest blockchain in terms of transaction speed, surpassing the current quickest network Solana.

• The public chain Aptos has been invested by well-known investment institutions including A16Z, Multicoin Capital, Three Arrows Capital, FTX Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, Binance. The startup was reportedly valued more than $4 billion.

• But the blockchain’s progress is somewhat behind its planning. Aptos has yet to start its fourth testnet — the last before the mainnet launch — that was supposed to begin in August according to its roadmap.

See related article: Aptos raises US$150 mln from FTX Ventures, Jump Crypto