CertiK Analyzes Zengo’s Secure Wallet to Uncover a Privileged User Vulnerability

CertiK, the leading blockchain security solutions provider, announces a successful collaboration with the ZenGo Wallet, the popular self-custodial MPC wallet provider, to fortify the security of its wallet application against privileged user attacks. The joint effort demonstrates CertiK’s commitment to conducting proactive in-house research and collaborating with external parties to raise the standard of security and transparency across the Web3 world.

CertiK’s SkyFall team conducted a comprehensive evaluation of ZenGo’s security design and implementation, focusing on the wallet’s ability to protect against advanced threats, such as advanced malware and rooted devices. Despite ZenGo’s robust security features, including its two-party signature scheme, TEE-based device protection, and biometric-enforced user sign-up and recovery, CertiK identified an inappropriate protected cryptographic management API issue that could be exploited in certain scenarios.

ZenGo responded quickly to CertiK’s findings, deploying a patch to fix the identified issue. CertiK’s thorough review of the patch confirmed its effectiveness, significantly bolstering the wallet’s security against privileged user attacks and rendering it more secure than traditional wallets which are still vulnerable to this type of attack. This collaboration demonstrates the importance of proactive security evaluations and the value of working with experienced security firms like CertiK to identify and address potential vulnerabilities.

“I’m proud of the work our engineers did to identify and address this security issue in one of the most secure mobile wallets,” said Kang Li, CertiK’s Chief Security Officer. “Even the MPC technology provides a strong defense, the specific implementation details can expose security risks if not designed well. This collaboration with ZenGo highlights the need for comprehensive security evaluations and reinforces CertiK’s commitment to raising the industry standard of security and transparency.”

“It was a pleasure to work closely with the CertiK team in a clear, professional, and proactive manner to quickly fix this issue and jointly publish a report to increase community awareness. CertiK’s discovery and ZenGo’s fix helped ensure that ZenGo is hardened against privileged attacks that traditional wallets cannot protect against,” said Tal Be’ery, ZenGo’s CTO and co-founder.

This partnership between CertiK and ZenGo showcases the shared commitment of both companies to create a more secure and transparent ecosystem for the rapidly expanding Web3 world. Builders, founders, and users can take confidence in the knowledge that CertiK’s comprehensive security suite and proactive research are raising the bar for security standards across the entire industry.