White hat hacker helps unlock 1,003 ETH from the 2016 HongCoin ICO contract

According to The Block, developer Florent used white-hat hacking techniques to help unlock approximately 1,003 ETH (worth about $2 million) that had been locked in the 2016 HongCoin ICO contract. Due to a coding error, the contract failed to issue refunds as intended. Florent discovered that by calling the administrator function and entering a specific value, the holder's balance could be reset and funds released. After successful verification on the testnet, the HongCoin team completed the unlock transaction with signatures from a multisignature address.