Israel extradites Nomad exploit suspect after rejecting 'code is law' defense

Israel handed Alexander Block to U.S. prosecutors on Thursday to face charges over a $2.8 million exploit of the Nomad crypto bridge.

The extradition was processed after Israel’s Supreme Court ruled that taking advantage of a software flaw can be criminal even when the code permits it and blocked any further appeals on the case.

Why was Alexander Block extradited to the U.S.?

Alexander Block, an Israeli-Russian citizen who previously went by Alexander Gurevich, has been handed over to U.S. prosecutors to face charges regarding a $2.8 million exploit of the Nomad crypto bridge.

Block argued before Israeli judges that despite the fact that he exploited a flaw, everything he did used functions Nomad’s automated system allowed. He also argued that the public blockchain record of his transfers cancels out any money-laundering charge.

The Supreme Court disagreed and ruled that deliberately exploiting a bug to take funds counts as criminal computer intrusion, and that the contract permitting his actions does not work as a defense. It also said that a wallet’s transactions being publicly visible doesn’t reveal who controls it, and doesn’t rule out an attempt to hide where the money came from.

Supreme Court President Isaac Amit then denied Block’s request for another hearing, and with no appeals left, the prosecution’s international department, the Israel Police, and Interpol coordinated his extradition.

How did the Nomad drain start?

Nomad was a bridge built by Illusory Systems that allowed users to move value between blockchains. It worked by locking assets on one chain before releasing matching tokens on another.

Prosecutors in the Northern District of California say a June 2022 update to Nomad’s smart contracts created a flaw in that system that was then exploited by bad actors.

The extradition request cited in the Israeli ruling says that a user named “Bitlik” was behind the first thefts. He allegedly made six test transfers to probe the bug, then four real ones worth more than $2.8 million on or around August 1, 2022.

To hide where the money came from, Block allegedly moved it between wallets and converted it into other cryptocurrencies.

His transfers also exposed the bug to everyone else. Other users rushed in and emptied a Nomad wallet that held more than $186 million, in a free-for-all that wiped out nearly all of the bridge’s funds.

In August 2023, a federal grand jury indicted Block on eight counts, covering computer fraud, transporting stolen property, and money laundering.

The U.S. asked for his extradition in December 2024, and Israeli police arrested him at Ben-Gurion Airport in May 2025 as he prepared to board a flight to Russia, days after he swapped the surname Gurevich for Block and picked up a passport in the new name.

Do U.S. juries agree with “code is law”?

Unlike the Israeli Supreme Court’s rejection of Block’s “code is law” argument, the U.S. verdicts have been inconsistent.

For example, in May 2025, U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian threw out the fraud convictions of Avraham Eisenberg, who had exploited the Mango Markets platform. His reasons were that New York was the wrong place to try the case, and that Mango Markets had no rule against what Eisenberg did.

“Code is law” is the argument that if a smart contract allows an action, the action can’t be a crime.

A Manhattan jury was locked in a stalemate in November 2025 over brothers Anton and James Peraire-Bueno, who were accused of a $25 million Ethereum scheme. The judge eventually declared a mistrial and prosecutors asked to retry them in early 2026.

Then on October 7, another Manhattan jury needed only about two hours to find Uranium Finance hacker Jonathan Spalletta guilty on computer-fraud and money-laundering counts tied to a pair of 2021 attacks that cost the exchange more than $50 million.