PANews reported on May 18 that Verus disclosed on its official Discord that the Verus-Ethereum cross-chain bridge was attacked at 23:55 UTC on May 17, 2026. The attackers transferred Ethereum, USDC, and tBTC assets from the Ethereum contract. The Verus network subsequently suspended operations, and most block-generating nodes have proactively gone offline to prevent further spread of the attack.

The project team stated that they are investigating the attack path and the extent of the damage, and that if the attackers return all funds, a bug bounty will be awarded and no further legal action will be taken. They also warned that anyone offering a "compensation plan" via private message is a scammer and should not interact with them.