Boltz halts swaps indefinitely as AI-assisted attacks overwhelm Bitcoin bridge

Boltz, the non-custodial bridge that lets users swap between Bitcoin’s mainchain, the Lightning Network, and the Liquid sidechain, pulled the plug on its services indefinitely on August 3. The reason: months of automated, AI-assisted attacks on its infrastructure that the small team simply couldn’t patch fast enough. No user funds were compromised, thanks to the platform’s non-custodial architecture built on hash time-locked contracts. But the company itself absorbed losses from contained exploits, and the shutdown ripples outward to every wallet and service that relied on Boltz as plumbing for cross-layer Bitcoin transactions. What happened and who’s affected The attacks reportedly escalated throughout July and into early August, with a sharp spike in the days just before the shutdown announcement. Boltz described the situation as a “major paradigm shift” for open-source Bitcoin services, a phrase that suggests the team doesn’t expect a quick return. The immediate casualties of the suspension include Aqua and Bull Bitcoin, two wallets that integrated Boltz’s swap functionality to give users seamless transitions between Lightning and Liquid. Those users now need to find alternative...