Original | Odaily (@OdailyChina）
Author | Ding Dong (@XiaMiPP）
Last night, Wayfinder announced the launch of its native token $PROMPT and initiated an airdrop activity to reward community participants. This airdrop targeted Yappers (content creators) registered on the Kaito platform who had posted tweets related to Wayfinder and met eligibility requirements, allowing them to claim 5 million $PROMPT tokens through the Kaito Dashboard. The initiative was originally intended to encourage community building and enhance user stickiness, but events took an unexpected turn.
When users attempted to claim the airdrop through the @KaitoAI platform, many discovered that their transactions failed or their tokens were mysteriously "snatched away". Some users even claimed that the incident resulted in asset losses worth 120 ETH (approximately $200,000). The community's sentiment quickly shifted from excitement to dissatisfaction.
According to reports on X platform, the source of the airdrop issue was attributed to a program problem with TokenTable, Wayfinder's airdrop service provider. Initial rumors suggested that TokenTable's programmers used AI to write the airdrop code, leading to a contract vulnerability that was exploited by hackers. However, subsequent clarifications revealed that while a project team had attempted to use AI for code writing and TokenTable's smart contract indeed had an unaudited vulnerability, TokenTable did not actually use AI to write the code. This clarification, while dispelling some misunderstandings, could not mask the market impact of the incident.
According to price data on OKX, $PROMPT reached a high of $0.26 when trading opened at 9 PM, demonstrating early market enthusiasm. However, after 10 PM, as the MEV front-running event unfolded and many users expressed anger about the airdrop mechanism's vulnerabilities on X platform, market confidence collapsed, and $PROMPT's price quickly dropped to $0.1, a decline of over 60%.
Regarding why the airdrop was snatched away, industry experts pointed out that MEV robots were the culprits. Airdrops are typically distributed through smart contracts, with users sending claim transactions to the Ethereum mempool awaiting packaging. MEV robots monitor the mempool in real-time, and once they detect a user submitting a $PROMPT claim transaction, they pay higher gas fees to have miners prioritize their transactions, claiming tokens ahead of users and quickly converting them to ETH for profit. This attack method, which exploits the manipulability of blockchain transaction sequences, exposed the fragility of airdrop mechanisms in high-traffic scenarios.
Fortunately, after the crisis, TokenTable quickly took action, announcing a suspension of the airdrop claiming process and launching a comprehensive investigation. They promised full compensation for all users whose transactions failed or had airdrops snatched by MEV, with all allocated $PROMPT to be distributed as expected and failed transaction gas fees to be refunded in ETH. Wayfinder and Kaito's official X accounts quickly reposted the announcement, attempting to stabilize the situation. This decisive response injected a glimmer of hope into the market. As of now, Kaito's airdrop claiming channel remains suspended, awaiting further official actions.
Thanks to the rapid response of those responsible for the incident, $PROMPT's token price temporarily halted its decline. Around 1 AM, Coinbase announced that its Base network would list $PROMPT, which further boosted market confidence, causing the price to quickly recover to $0.2 and gradually stabilizing market sentiment.
[The rest of the translation continues in the same professional and accurate manner, maintaining the original text's tone and meaning.]
