Sandwiched and Silent: Behavioral Adaptation and Private Channel Exploitation in Ethereum MEV
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arXiv
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| Natura: | Preprint |
| Pubblicazione: |
2025
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| _version_ | 1866917157302960128 |
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| author | Mancino, Davide Rezzoli, Davide |
| author_facet | Mancino, Davide Rezzoli, Davide |
| contents | How users adapt after being sandwiched remains unclear; this paper provides an empirical quantification. Using transaction level data from November 2024 to February 2025, enriched with mempool visibility and ZeroMEV labels, we track user outcomes after their n-th public sandwich: (i) reactivation, i.e., the resumption of on-chain activity within a 60-day window, and (ii) first-time adoption of private routing. We refer to users who do not reactivate within this window as churned, and to users experiencing multiple attacks (n>1) as undergoing repeated exposure. Our analysis reveals measurable behavioral adaptation: around 40% of victims migrate to private routing within 60 days, rising to 54% with repeated exposures. Churn peaks at 7.5% after the first sandwich but declines to 1-2%, consistent with survivor bias. In Nov-Dec 2024 we confirm 2,932 private sandwich attacks affecting 3,126 private victim transactions, producing \$409,236 in losses and \$293,786 in attacker profits. A single bot accounts for nearly two-thirds of private frontruns, and private sandwich activity is heavily concentrated on a small set of DEX pools. These results highlight that private routing does not guarantee protection from MEV extraction: while execution failures push users toward private channels, these remain exploitable and highly concentrated, demanding continuous monitoring and protocol-level defenses. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2512_17602 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Sandwiched and Silent: Behavioral Adaptation and Private Channel Exploitation in Ethereum MEV Mancino, Davide Rezzoli, Davide Cryptography and Security Computational Engineering, Finance, and Science How users adapt after being sandwiched remains unclear; this paper provides an empirical quantification. Using transaction level data from November 2024 to February 2025, enriched with mempool visibility and ZeroMEV labels, we track user outcomes after their n-th public sandwich: (i) reactivation, i.e., the resumption of on-chain activity within a 60-day window, and (ii) first-time adoption of private routing. We refer to users who do not reactivate within this window as churned, and to users experiencing multiple attacks (n>1) as undergoing repeated exposure. Our analysis reveals measurable behavioral adaptation: around 40% of victims migrate to private routing within 60 days, rising to 54% with repeated exposures. Churn peaks at 7.5% after the first sandwich but declines to 1-2%, consistent with survivor bias. In Nov-Dec 2024 we confirm 2,932 private sandwich attacks affecting 3,126 private victim transactions, producing \$409,236 in losses and \$293,786 in attacker profits. A single bot accounts for nearly two-thirds of private frontruns, and private sandwich activity is heavily concentrated on a small set of DEX pools. These results highlight that private routing does not guarantee protection from MEV extraction: while execution failures push users toward private channels, these remain exploitable and highly concentrated, demanding continuous monitoring and protocol-level defenses. |
| title | Sandwiched and Silent: Behavioral Adaptation and Private Channel Exploitation in Ethereum MEV |
| topic | Cryptography and Security Computational Engineering, Finance, and Science |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.17602 |