Sui's validator coordination was a good emergency response

Claim


Opposing arguments

The ability of Sui validators to censor specific addresses in the wake of the Cetus exploit set a precedent that challenges the foundational premise of permissionless blockchains, raising the risk that discretionary censorship may become normalized regardless of justification
Unlocking the frozen funds requires an on-chain vote, but the centralized distribution of SUI tokens may influence the outcome, potentially limiting the effectiveness of decentralized decision-making.
The decision to freeze $162 million in hacked assets on Sui was made by a subset of validators without prior approval from token holders, DAO members, or any formalized community process

Related projects

Cetus Protocol
SUI

Related topics

Ethics

Supporting arguments

A project’s decision not to intervene in the face of malicious activity may expose it to legal liability and ethical scrutiny
Blockchain participants have a fundamental duty to intervene against illicit activity, a responsibility grounded in long-standing legal principles, even if not explicitly stated in writing
The emergency freeze of $160 million in stolen Sui assets created a critical time window for forensics, tracing, and potential collaboration with law enforcement agencies
Sui’s emergency freeze echoed established practices in traditional finance, where transactional holds are both standard and mandatory in response to fraud events
Validators are supposed to operate in a semi-custodial role, forming an implicit trust agreement with users of the network
The ability to respond swiftly to security threats is essential for enterprise-grade DeFi and institutional applications, and the Sui network demonstrated this capability by freezing $160 million in stolen assets within hours of the Cetus exploit