Flashbots Bundle Rescue Limits for Compromised Wallets

A bundle can rescue only assets that still require your compromised wallet’s signature to move, and only if the rescue is included before the sweeper’s transaction. If an attacker can move an asset without that signature, a bundle cannot protect it.

Assets Requiring Your Signature May Be Rescuable

A bundle may help with tokens still in the wallet when the attacker must use the compromised key to transfer them. A bundle groups transactions for private submission and atomic inclusion: either the group is included together, or none of it is. Flashbots Docs’ “eth_sendBundle” and “sending bundles” documentation describes this private delivery and all-or-nothing inclusion. That mechanism can let a rescue transaction compete with a sweeper without exposing it publicly first; it does not revoke the attacker’s independent ways to move assets.

Some assets need an extra transaction before they can be transferred. A locked or vested token may require an unlock, and an airdrop may require a claim. Those assets are candidates only if the required claim or unlock and the transfer can happen in the same bundle. If the first transaction makes tokens transferable and the second sends them to safety, atomic inclusion prevents the sweeper from acting between those steps. Whether a particular contract allows that sequence depends on its rules.

Attacker-Controlled Approvals Make Those Tokens Unrescuable

Tokens approved to an attacker-controlled spender can be pulled without another signature from your wallet. An approval is permission recorded by the token contract for another address to transfer tokens up to the allowed amount. The attacker can use that permission in a separate transaction, so bundling your own transfer does not cancel or outrun the approval as a reliable protection.

Use the wallet’s approval list to identify which spenders have permission over each token, and whether an approval is unlimited or capped. If a spender belongs to the attacker, treat the affected tokens as exposed even while they remain visible in your balance. That list helps classify the risk; it cannot establish who controls an unfamiliar spender by itself.

Do Not Fund the Wallet Publicly Before Deciding

Sending gas ETH to the compromised wallet in a public transaction can give the sweeper the opportunity to take it before your rescue executes. A rescue that needs gas therefore depends on arranging execution without first advertising a spendable balance. If some assets have already moved, judge only what remains: prior transfers are not reversed by a later bundle.

Also treat contract ownership and roles separately from token balances. If the attacker has already taken an owner or privileged role, a bundle cannot undo that transfer; the role may let them move or control assets through the contract without your key. For each remaining asset, ask whether the next required action needs your signature or can be made by an attacker-controlled spender or role. That distinction is why Flashbots MEV matters to this decision: private atomic inclusion can affect a race for key-dependent transfers, while it does not block actions the attacker can authorize independently.

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