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In 2025, crypto users moved over $1.3 trillion in annual assets across different chains, driven in part by arbitrage, yield optimization, and liquidity aggregation.
Cross-chain technologies, built to unlock capital efficiency and broader market access, made these transactions possible by enabling traders, protocols, and liquidity providers to operate across blockchain networks.
This article explores the benefits of cross-chain activity and the growing risks that come with it. It also shows how Turnkey helps teams reduce those risks by giving them full control over what gets signed.
What is cross-chain technology?
Cross-chain technology is the infrastructure that allows blockchain systems to communicate and interact with one another. With cross-chain tools, users and smart contracts can transfer assets and data between otherwise isolated networks like Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche, and their respective scaling layers.
This capability unlocks a growing class of multichain applications, from cross-chain swaps to decentralized applications (dApps) that integrate across multiple chains.
What is an example of a cross-chain protocol?
Two notable examples are LayerZero and Cosmos IBC:
- LayerZero is a messaging protocol that enables smart contracts to communicate across blockchains. It uses two off-chain components, an oracle and a relayer, to verify and transmit messages. This setup lets developers build multichain apps while maintaining a single logical interface.
- Cosmos IBC (Inter-Blockchain Communication) is a protocol that connects independent blockchains built with the Cosmos SDK. IBC is integrated at the consensus layer, making it a foundational part of the Cosmos ecosystem’s cross-chain blockchain architecture.
Cross-chain solutions: Bridges, protocols, and message passing
Cross-chain solutions support a wide range of use cases from token transfers to cross-chain governance and composability. These solutions typically fall into three broad categories:
- Bridges are the most widely used cross-chain tools. They lock assets on one chain and mint a wrapped version on another, enabling users to move tokens across networks. Examples include Hop, Synapse, and Stargate.
- Messaging protocols enable the passing of arbitrary data structures, such as function calls, governance votes, or oracle messages, between chains. Protocols like Wormhole, Hyperlane, and Axelar make it possible for smart contracts on one chain to trigger logic on another without transferring tokens.
- Consensus-layer interoperability is built into ecosystems like Cosmos and Polkadot. These systems allow chains to communicate natively using shared standards and messaging formats, offering more tightly integrated interoperability.
What is the main goal of cross-chain?
The primary goal of cross-chain technology is to enable the seamless, trustless movement of assets and data between blockchains, without sacrificing decentralization.
In practice, this means:
- Letting users interact with dApps across ecosystems without switching wallets or bridges.
- Allowing protocols to tap into liquidity wherever it lives, not just on a single chain.
- Enabling smart contracts to coordinate logic and state across networks.
- Breaking down ecosystem silos that trap capital and fragment user experiences.
By eliminating the need for centralized custodians or manual workflows, cross-chain infrastructure pushes Web3 closer to a unified, interoperable future where applications are chain-agnostic and value flows freely.
The promise and peril of cross-chain technology
While cross-chain technology offers clear advantages, it also comes with serious security risks. Collectively, bridge protocols lost over $1–2 billion in 2022 and 2023, representing nearly 40–69% of all DeFi hacks during that period.
Several high-profile attacks underscore this:
- In the Ronin Bridge Hack (March 2022), the North Korean-linked Lazarus Group exploited compromised validator private keys to execute unauthorized withdrawals worth nearly $600 million in USDC and ETH.
- In the BNB Bridge Hack (October 2022), an attacker forged cross-chain messages in the BSC Token Hub, a bridge between BNB Beacon Chain and BNB Smart Chain, draining roughly $570 million.
These incidents aren’t just outliers. They exemplify structural flaws in how many cross-chain systems are built today. A recent survey from Chainlink pinpoints weak private key management, lack of monitoring and rate limits, and missing active checks as some of the most common vulnerabilities in cross-chain bridges.
Without stronger signing guarantees and policy enforcement at the transaction layer, cross-chain hacks are not exceptions. They’re an expectation.
The wallet challenge: securing cross-chain holdings
As cross-chain adoption accelerates, wallet infrastructure must evolve to operate securely across fragmented ecosystems. Without the right safeguards, users are exposed to protocol-specific risks that can compromise assets, approvals, and transaction integrity across multiple chains.
A single compromised dApp or smart contract on one chain can jeopardize access to wallets or assets across others, especially if keys aren’t isolated or scoped per environment.
Multichain wallets can further increase this risk. When a wallet accepts cross-chain transaction requests from any chain without validation, it opens the door to chain-specific attack vectors. Malicious contracts can exploit inconsistencies in logic, permissions, or message formats between ecosystems.
Finally, conflicting standards and signature schemes introduce complexity that increases the likelihood of human error. For example, Ethereum’s EIP-712 and Solana’s ed25519 operate under entirely different assumptions. Without consistent message formatting and validation, policy enforcement becomes fragmented, and transaction review becomes unreliable.
Securing cross-chain wallets requires purpose-built infrastructure. If wallets aren’t using policies to enforce intent at the signing layer, then their key management strategies will fail to prevent misuse even if the underlying cryptography remains uncompromised.
Where traditional custody breaks down
The problem only becomes more magnified when we look at legacy solutions that were built for single-chain, uniform environments. When applied to modern cross-chain workflows, these solutions fall short, unable to provide the context-aware controls that today’s developers and applications require.
Hardware security modules (HSMs) and traditional custodians are not designed for cross-chain signing. They rely on consistent transaction formats, but cross-chain flows introduce variability that breaks those assumptions. As a result, critical gaps emerge in how transactions are validated and monitored.
Similarly, multi-party computation (MPC) and key sharding secure the key material, but not the action being signed. These systems operate without visibility into the transaction's structure or intent. They lack native awareness of chain-specific context and therefore cannot parse, interpret, or enforce business logic across protocols.
Most signing systems see only raw bytes and don’t know what the transaction actually does. Without parsing structured data or inspecting the protocol, they can’t enforce rules based on which contract is called, what function is used, or which chain it’s from. This makes cross-chain operations vulnerable to mistakes and attacks.
Turnkey secures cross-chain wallets by design
Turnkey is purpose-built for the demands of multichain environments, where fragmented standards, bridge vulnerabilities, and inconsistent wallet logic introduce real risk.
By combining secure enclave-based key management with a programmable policy engine, Turnkey ensures every signature reflects verified intent, regardless of the chain or protocol involved.
Here’s how Turnkey eliminates the core risks of cross-chain signing:
Enclave-Isolated Key Custody
Private keys are generated and stored inside AWS Nitro Enclaves–hardware-isolated environments with no external network access. Raw private keys are never exported, reconstructed, or exposed.
Per-Chain Policy Enforcement
Each wallet can enforce custom logic at the signing layer, restricting which chains, contracts, methods, and users are allowed. Rate limits, contract allowlists, and caller validation are built-in.
Native EIP-712 Parsing
Structured data support lets Turnkey inspect and validate typed messages (e.g., Permit, Permit2) before signing. This prevents replay attacks and misuse across chains.
Fast, Deterministic Signing with Built-In Guardrails
Turnkey enforces security policies without slowing down execution. Signing remains fast and predictable, even in automated or high-frequency workflows.
Transparent Logs and Auditable Actions
Every signing action is logged with full context–who requested it, what was signed, and why it passed policy. This gives teams provable control over multichain activity.
With Turnkey, developers and organizations get the confidence to operate securely in multichain environments—without giving up control, speed, or flexibility.
Common cross-chain vulnerabilities and Turnkey's protections
Below are several security vulnerabilities associated with cross-chain protocols and how Turnkey’s solutions help mitigate these risks.
Build securely across chains with Turnkey
Cross-chain technology is rapidly reshaping the Web3 landscape, enabling greater liquidity, utility, and user experience across fragmented ecosystems.
As the foundation of decentralized finance grows increasingly reliant on interoperable blockchain technology, the need for secure signing infrastructure is critical.
Turnkey gives developers the tools they need to build with confidence across chains, without compromising control, speed, or intent.
If you’re building DeFi apps, cross-chain wallets, or bridges, now is the time to rethink your signing infrastructure.
Get started with Turnkey today and secure every signature, on every chain, by design.
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