Stopping the Linea blockchain shows the slow decentralization of Ethereum L2s

The Ethereum Layer-2 blockchain's decision to halt production after the Linea hack highlights the need for Layer-2 companies to eventually prioritize decentralization, said Alex Gluchowski, CEO of MetLabs.

On June 2, more than $2.6 million in Ether (ETH) was transferred from Consensys-Launched Linea after a hacker was able to exploit Linea-based decentralized exchange Velocore, Linea explained in an X post.

Linea has since launched blockchain production, but the team's decision to stop the zkEVM blockchain shows the importance of decentralization on the Ethereum layer, according to Gluchowski.

“Decentralizing the chain is not an option. Every serious L2 stack has to race to do it first,” said Gluchowski, whose company is behind Lina's competitors in zkSync.

He got a response from Linea's head of product Dylan Fox, who agreed that decentralization is not an option, but emphasized that the network is on a “strong path” to decentralize in a much shorter time window than many of its competitors.

“Since not many rollup frames are more than 2 years ahead of us, I am very pleased with our progress.”

Linea announced its “The Linea Voyage: Surge” campaign in April, which aims to increase the total value locked on Linea to $3 billion. According to L2BEAT, a little over $1.2 billion is locked up on the blockchain.

However, one viewer criticized the company for targeting it in light of recent hacking activity.

Stopping Linea was a “last resort” measure.

The Linea team said it had no choice but to end the series to avoid raising additional funds.

“This was the last resort step to protect users on Linea.”

Linea said it was notified of the hack by Hexagate, which helped trace the stolen user funds, vulnerable smart contracts and exploit addresses. Linnea said that it was “the middle of the night” in their time zone, so they couldn't get to Velocore right away.

“Like other L2s, we're still in the ‘training wheels' phase of existence, which gives us buffers to use.”

The hacker exploited Linea-based DEX Velocore, which moved 700 Ether – worth more than $2.6 million – from Linea via a third-party bridge.

The series stops between blocks 5081800 and 5081801.

The company further emphasized its intention to decentralize the Linnea network, including its consistency, which would prevent the company from blocking production and censoring addresses.

Meanwhile, Velocor said it is working with the foreign networks involved to provide compensation to the affected victims.

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Linea states that the network is safe and secure.

Consensys launched Linea in August 2023, onboarding more than 50 partners and tying up more than $26 million in Ether at the time.

Almost all Ethereum layer-2 solutions, including Base, remain centralized.

According to L2BEAT data, Coinbase is currently the only follower of Base. However, the organization has confirmed its desire to decentralize its base from time to time.

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