The crypto world is abuzz after Binance founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao reignited the debate on MEV (Maximum Extractable Value) and front-running with a radical new idea: a dark pool-style decentralized exchange (DEX) for perpetual futures. But as CZ’s proposal stirs the pot, rival security teams are rolling out their own solutions — turning 2025 into a high-stakes arms race for DeFi’s future. CZ’s Vision: A Dark Pool DEX to Hide Big Trades On June 1, CZ traveled to X to ask why every order on a DEX must be public, especially in the upper echelon world of perpetuals where liquidations can be ”hunted” by competitors and bots. ”If you want to buy $1 billion of a coin, you typically wouldn't want other people to know about your order until it's complete,” he posted, citing a recent $100 million liquidation on Hyperliquid that most suspect was organized by opportunistic traders. CZ's answer: a dark pool DEX, in which liquidation points and trades are hidden until they are executed. He suggests that zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs) and encrypted order books be used to hide large trades from view — borrowing a privacy concept from traditional finance and moving it to the forefront of DeFi. The goal? Make front-running and MEV attacks nearly impossible, bringing institutional-grade trading to crypto. “I have always been puzzled with the fact that everyone can see your orders in real-time on a DEX. The problem is worse on a perp DEX where there are liquidations.” — @cz_binance The Security Race: Wintermute's ”CrimeEnjoyor” and BitMEX's Lazarus Defense While CZ's proposal is still on paper, others are fighting real threats today. Top market maker Wintermute has newly launched ”CrimeEnjoyor” — a tool that infuses on-chain notifications into Ethereum contracts that have been marked as wallet drainers. Such notices target a spike in malicious EIP-7702 delegations, with over 97% of such type of contracts now marked as sweepers that drain hacked wallets automatically. Wintermute's fix: reverse-engineer the evil bytecode, insert a warning message, and make it clear to anyone inspecting the contract. It's a clever trick on the transparency problem, attempting to protect users from the dark side of DeFi composability. “These are sweepers, used to automatically drain incoming ETH from compromised addresses... This one copy-pasted bytecode now accounts for the majority of all EIP-7702 delegations. It’s funny, bleak, and fascinating at the same time.” — @wintermute_t In the meantime, BitMEX recently thwarted a phishing assault by the notorious Lazarus Group, proving that even nation-state hackers can err. BitMEX security experts traced the attack to a misconfigured database, pointing to the never-ending cat-and-mouse situation between hackers and protectors. Are These Fixes Realistic? Devs Weigh In Developer reaction to CZ's dark pool DEX is mixed. Some applaud the vision, commenting that ZKPs and encrypted mempools will finally bring privacy to DeFi trading. Others are warning that hiding orders on-chain is both a technical and a philosophical issue—transparency is one of the core DeFi principles, and trustless privacy is hard to scale. Wintermute's ”CrimeEnjoyor” has been seen as a clever band-aid but no panacea: ”It's a step in the right direction, but as long as users have private keys, phishing and wallet-draining will remain a threat,” remarked an Ethereum core dev. “CZ’s dark pool DEX could unlock institutional DeFi, but it’s a moonshot. CrimeEnjoyor is clever, but we need more than warnings to fix wallet security.”— @deanmlittle The 2025 Security Arms Race: Who's Ahead? As DeFi grows, so do the threats. CZ’s dark pool DEX could be a turning point if the tech catches up to the vision. Wintermute’s scanner and BitMEX’s vigilance show that defense is evolving, but the attackers aren’t standing still. As the security arms race heats up, the only certainty is that DeFi’s battle with MEV and front-running is far from over—and the next breakthrough could come from anywhere.
