Safe Harbor Agreement
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In March 2025, Inverse Finance DAO adopted the SEAL Whitehat Safe Harbor Agreement to strengthen our protocol’s ability to respond swiftly to active exploits. Safe Harbor represents a breakthrough in blockchain security, allowing vetted whitehats to legally intervene during live attacks, rescue imperiled assets, and redirect them to protocol-owned vaults. This process not only deters malicious actors but also rewards proactive defenders, enhancing our overall security posture.
Why It Matters
Traditional responsible disclosure processes and bug bounties are reactive, guiding whitehats to report vulnerabilities once they’ve discovered them. However, during an ongoing exploit, timely intervention can make the difference between a small loss and a catastrophic one. Safe Harbor legally empowers whitehats to act immediately, recovering funds without fearing legal repercussions. By coupling financial incentives with explicit legal clarity, Safe Harbor fosters a community-driven approach to real-time security, filling a critical gap in DeFi’s defense mechanisms.
Implementation at Inverse Finance
Bounty Terms: Whitehats receive up to 10% of the recovered assets, capped at $1,000,000.
Recovery Addresses: Funds are sent to specific on-chain addresses managed by Inverse Finance.
Anonymous Participation: Whitehats can remain anonymous, requiring no identity verification to ensure broader participation and faster rescues.
On-Chain Registration: The agreement is registered on Ethereum via the Safe Harbor Registry, guaranteeing transparency and immutability.
Ongoing Scope Updates: Newly deployed contracts can be added to the Safe Harbor scope via governance, ensuring continued coverage.
User Agreement to be Bound By Agreement, Consent to Attempted Eligible Funds Rescues and Payment of Bounties
The User hereby acknowledges and agrees to, and consents to be bound by the terms and conditions of, that certain Safe Harbor Agreement for Whitehats, adopted by the Inverse Finance DAO on March 5th, 2025 (the “Whitehat Agreement”), available here, as a “User” and member of the “Protocol Community” thereunder. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing:
the User hereby consents to Whitehats attempting Eligible Funds Rescues of any and all Tokens deposited into the Protocol by the User and the deduction of Bounties out of User’s deposited Tokens to compensate Eligible Whitehats for successful Eligible Funds Rescues;
the User acknowledges and agrees that Tokens may be lost, stolen, suffer diminished value, or become disabled or frozen in connection with attempts at Eligible Funds Rescues, and assumes all the risk of the foregoing;
the User acknowledges and agrees that payment of the Bounty as a deduction from User’s Tokens to an Eligible Whitehat may constitute a taxable disposition by the User of the deducted Tokens, and agrees to assume to all risk of such adverse tax treatment; and
the User agrees to hold the other Protocol Community Members harmless from any loss, liability or other damages suffered by the User in connection with attempted Eligible Funds Exploits under the Whitehat Agreement.
