Who Got Rugged?

Tired developers and million-dollar mistakes go together like peanut butter and financial ruin.

Someone raised 77 million POL tokens in a presale, ready to revolutionize whatever it is they claimed to revolutionize.

But somewhere between collecting user funds and deploying smart contracts, their "too tired" developer decided that reading documentation was optional.

A botched proxy upgrade turned $20 million worth of POL into digital fossils - permanently locked in a contract that forgot how to unlock itself.

The mistake unfolded live in the Ethereum Security Telegram channel, complete with a user named Bruce Lee desperately asking about why his contract funds can not be withdrawn?

Unlike his legendary namesake who preached "be like water," this Bruce Lee proved that liquidity can indeed crash - spectacularly.

Where the real Bruce Lee taught adaptation and formlessness, this one proved rigidly committed to disaster.

What happens when your biggest technical decision gets made by someone who should have gone to bed hours ago?

Enter the Dragon... of Incompetence

In the early hours of September 13th, while most developers were sleeping, some user named Bruce Lee was wide awake in Ethereum Security Telegram, about to demonstrate why coding and exhaustion don't mix.

"Hey Guys I meet some problem," he typed, channeling exactly zero of his namesake's legendary precision. "My contacts fund cannot be withdrawn. About 22m."

The real Bruce Lee wrote about "stick ability or stoppage" - when the mind stops and loses its mobility in combat.

This Bruce Lee had achieved the ultimate stoppage: his proxy contract's mind had stopped so completely that 77.098 million MATIC worth $20 million as of press time, became as immovable as a statue.

Where the master philosopher sought to avoid mental rigidity, this digital disaster had created the most rigid situation possible - funds frozen in perpetual ice.

His problem wasn't complex: a proxy upgrade had set the wrong implementation contract, wiping out admin and upgrade roles like a bad martial arts movie where the hero forgets all his moves at the crucial moment.

How do you explain to 77 million POL worth of presale investors that your proxy upgrade just pulled a reverse Bruce Lee - instead of flowing like water, it froze like concrete?

The Mystery of the Dragon

YannickCrypto had seen enough carnage to deliver his investigation via Twitter: "I guess @JUDAOGlobal (not sure if its them) made a presale and collected 77 MILLION POL. But the hiverr dev forget to reinitialize the contract while changing the implementation contract to a new contract. Pooofff $22,000,000 gone."

YannickCrypto later hinted at the forensic breadcrumb that led to this tentative identification - the kind of careful detective work that makes security researchers invaluable to the crypto ecosystem.

The tentative attribution came from a single cryptic Twitter reply that had instructions for the account opening process, and listed the following as a "Vault" address:

0x7D341e757f893e1a13D40370d0F6065ca9c4777E

The project had deployed a proxy contract that ended up holding millions in POL tokens.

Who exactly got rekt here remains a mystery - the anonymous nature of the project means presale participants likely still don't know what happened to their funds.

Instead of revolutionary DeFi, they got revolutionary incompetence.

But who was behind the wheel when this digital disaster struck?

Fists of Error

"Can you delete this post?" Bruce Lee begged in the Telegram, desperation dripping from every character: "That is a bad news for our users."

YannickCrypto's response was swift and merciless: "bro you locked ALL FUNDS of your users, you have other problems."

As dawn broke, the community's diagnosis became increasingly brutal.

Under mounting pressure, Bruce Lee eventually attempted to deflect responsibility: "Not me. The prev dev, he is too tired when upgrading this contract. Set a wrong contract."

The classic move - blame the previous developer.

According to the fake Bruce Lee's version of events, some exhausted predecessor had botched the proxy upgrade by setting the wrong implementation address, wiping out all admin privileges in the process.

Whether this mysterious "prev dev" actually existed or was just a convenient scapegoat remained unclear.

YannickCrypto's explanation was zen-like in its simplicity: "I mean the dev was tired."

The roasting had reached terminal velocity.

"Launch a memecoin maybe ppl will buy your story," one person suggested.

Another chimed in: "Slerf?" - referring to the infamous Solana disaster where a developer accidentally burned millions by clicking the wrong button.

Hours later, as the Ethereum Security Telegram continued dissecting the disaster, Mudit Gupta proposed the ultimate tongue in cheek Hail Mary: "What if they created a governance proposal for pol staker, bribing them to recover the funds."

"Pol wars," came the reply.

Fat chance. Getting Polygon governance to fork the network for an unidentified project this incompetent would be like asking Bruce Lee to resurrect himself just to teach basic smart contract security.

The silence that followed spoke volumes about the mystery project's prospects for recovery.

How do you explain that someone named Bruce Lee got knocked out by his own incompetence?

True mastery transcends any particular art, Bruce Lee once wrote.

Whatever project was behind this disaster mastered the art of vanishing without a trace.

No public statement, no blog post explaining the disaster, no recovery roadmap - just radio silence punctuated by the sound of over $20 million hitting the digital equivalent of concrete.

It does not help that the user named Bruce Lee did not identify his project, besides dropping a contract address:

0x7D341e757f893e1a13D40370d0F6065ca9c4777E

While their legendary namesake taught that "the spirit harbors nothing in it" to achieve perfect responsiveness, this Bruce Lee had achieved something more impressive: a spirit that harbored absolutely nothing, including responsibility for the mess he created.

The real Bruce Lee wrote about achieving "purposelessness" through disciplined training.

This Bruce Lee achieved purposelessness by writing purposeless code that turned over $20 million worth of POL into the world's most expensive screensaver.

His proxy upgrade created the ultimate digital art installation, perfectly preserved behind unbreakable smart contract glass, viewable by all, touchable by none.

The mystery deepens with each passing day.

Could it be Judao Global?

As security researcher Zilayo noted, JUDAO appears to be a complete black box.

Their Twitter page is bare bones, not much activity lately, no way to reach them, no acknowledgment that millions in user funds are permanently locked. So hard to tell if it actually them.

Rekt News reached out to JuCoin Labs, who announced a partnership with JUDAO, but received no response.

But plot twist time: what if this wasn't just garden-variety incompetence?

The whole setup reeks of something fishier than a week-old sushi buffet.

Maybe user funds were never supposed to make it back out alive, and our wannabe Bruce Lee accidentally locked himself out of his own con.

Whatever project lies behind this disaster has achieved something remarkable: a spirit that harbors absolutely nothing, including responsibility for the mess they created.

If this was indeed a presale operation, participants likely remain completely unaware their funds are frozen forever, still waiting for tokens that will never arrive.

The address currently sits unlabeled on Arkham, holding over $20 million in POL with nothing but "Fundpool (Proxy)" as identification.

Someone out there knows who's behind this mess.

If anyone can definitively identify this project or has information about the locked funds, drop the crypto community a line - we'd love to properly label one of 2025's most expensive screw ups.

But seriously, who got rugged here? The anonymous project creators, the clueless presale participants, or the Temu version of Bruce Lee?

When your greatest achievement is accidentally rugpulling yourself, have you mastered the art of failure or just proven that some dragons should never have left their cave?

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