NEAR Intents blocked over $50 million in attempted transfers linked to the Bitget hack that drained $387.5 million on Thursday, according to Alex Shevchenko, general manager of the cross-chain protocol. The protocol's SHIELD system froze $503,000 during execution and allowed around $166,000 in suspected stolen funds to pass through before the remainder moved to other providers. Shevchenko said NEAR Intents will forego the 5% bounty Bitget offered for freezing attacker funds and an additional 5% for recovery, allowing more funds to be returned through an appropriate legal process. Circle and Tether blacklisted a wallet linked to the exploiter on Friday, freezing $318,013 of stablecoins, per onchain data.

The move puts protocol-level censorship back in focus and draws a contrast with THORChain, which said it does not selectively freeze individual swaps. Bitget CEO Gracy Chen called on THORChain to refuse service to addresses linked to the attack, but THORChain said it does not censor by design and that network halts are emergency security mechanisms, not selective freezes. Shevchenko argued that permissionless systems do not have to be neutral and that refusing to launder stolen assets is a design choice. He said crypto cannot demand recognition of digital property rights while building infrastructure optimized for monetizing stolen property.

This is a sector positioning event, not a trade setup. Its decision to actively block funds creates a two-tier market — one set of rails that filters illicit flows and another that does not. The next hack will see attackers route around these freezes, concentrating laundering activity on protocols that explicitly refuse to censor. For traders, this suggests bridge and DEX token performance may increasingly split on compliance versus neutrality — projects that mirror NEAR Intents' stance may attract institutional flow, while those that follow THORChain's approach may see higher retail volumes but face regulatory pressure.

Watch for statements from major cross-chain protocols over the coming days. If more projects adopt active filtering, this could drive a sector repricing that favors compliance-first infrastructure and penalizes neutrality-first protocols in jurisdictions with strong AML enforcement. If most protocols stay silent or echo THORChain, the status quo holds and this remains a contained incident.

Source: CoinTelegraph