{"coverage_note":"Five categories were checked for aave.com: (1) discrepancy_pricing \u2014 a verified finding was present: undisclosed interface-level swap fees collected via the CoW Swap integration are routed to an Aave Labs multisig without user disclosure, confirmed by on-chain analysis and governance forum reports from Q4 2025. (2) discrepancy_availability \u2014 no finding: Aave's algorithmically variable rates are a disclosed feature of the protocol, and no evidence of bait-and-switch or inaccessible advertised rates was found. (3) discrepancy_identity \u2014 no finding: Aave is a non-custodial DeFi protocol with no traditional merchant of record; a governance dispute over brand assets was found but did not surface a transactional counterparty identity problem. (4) discrepancy_policy \u2014 no finding: Aave's ToS disclaim refunds, and one historical oracle-related liquidation remediation was consistent with the protocol's stated posture rather than contradicting it. (5) discrepancy_undisclosed_constraint \u2014 a verified finding was present: reserve freezes, market pauses, and supply/borrow cap exhaustion can block transactions mid-workflow without prominent real-time warnings in the main interface, confirmed by a 2026 governance forum post and Aave's own official communications about the rsETH market freeze.","human_handoff_required_for":[{"action":"Escalate to a human when a swap transaction executed via the aave.com frontend results in a fee discrepancy \u2014 specifically when the fee paid differs from any fee displayed pre-transaction, or when the user questions who received the swap fee, because interface-level adapter fees are routed to an Aave Labs-controlled multisig wallet without upfront disclosure and cannot be recovered or disputed through the protocol.","evidence":[{"description":"On-chain analysis and governance forum reports from Q4 2025 confirmed that swap fees collected via the CoW Swap DEX integration on the aave.com frontend are routed to a multisig controlled by Aave Labs (a private entity), not the Aave DAO treasury, without disclosure to users at the point of transaction.","reference":"https://governance.aave.com"}],"last_checked_date":"2026-06-28"},{"action":"Escalate to a human when a withdrawal of supplied collateral is blocked mid-workflow due to a governance-imposed reserve freeze or market pause \u2014 for example, when a user has zero outstanding debt but cannot withdraw ETH collateral on Arbitrum because the reserve was frozen by a governance vote \u2014 since the freeze cannot be reversed by the user and no automated resolution path exists.","evidence":[{"description":"A governance forum post from 2026 documents a user unable to withdraw already-supplied ETH collateral on Arbitrum (with zero debt) because a governance decision froze the reserve, and Aave's official account confirmed rsETH markets on V3 and V4 were frozen in 2026 following a third-party bridge exploit.","reference":"https://governance.aave.com"}],"last_checked_date":"2026-06-28"},{"action":"Escalate to a human when a supply or borrow transaction fails mid-workflow because a reserve's supply cap or borrow cap has been fully consumed by concurrent users, leaving the user with a failed transaction and assets not deployed, as this state can change at any block and cannot be resolved by retrying the same call without first verifying live cap headroom.","evidence":[{"description":"Aave's reserve configuration includes supply caps and borrow caps that can be exhausted by concurrent user activity; these limits are documented in developer docs but are not prominently surfaced as real-time warnings before a user initiates a transaction on the main interface.","reference":"https://docs.aave.com/developers/whats-new/supply-borrow-caps"}],"last_checked_date":"2026-06-28"},{"action":"Escalate to a human when a transaction is blocked because an entire Aave market or reserve has been paused or frozen at the time of submission and the user's funds are already supplied into that market \u2014 the user's ability to withdraw is constrained by governance action and requires monitoring governance proposals and community channels for unfreeze timelines, which is beyond automated resolution.","evidence":[{"description":"Aave's own official account confirmed that rsETH markets on Aave V3 and V4 were frozen in 2026 due to a third-party bridge exploit, preventing new deposits and borrowing; the freeze was imposed by governance and cannot be lifted by individual users.","reference":"https://governance.aave.com"}],"last_checked_date":"2026-06-28"}],"record_verification":{"last_checked_agentic_scan":"2026-06-29","last_checked_human_verified":null},"vendor_id":"aave","verified_discrepancies":[{"actuals":"On-chain analysis and governance forum complaints confirmed that swap fees collected via the CoW Swap DEX integration on the aave.com frontend are routed to a multisignature wallet controlled by Aave Labs \u2014 a centralized, private entity \u2014 rather than the Aave DAO treasury as users and delegates had previously understood. This fee diversion was not disclosed to users at the point of transaction, meaning users executing swaps on aave.com were paying undisclosed interface fees with no prior notice of who receives them or why.","discrepancy_start_date_est":"Q4 2025 (approximately October\u2013November 2025, coinciding with the CoW Swap DEX integration rollout)","evidence":[{"description":"Bankless reported that Aave Labs confirmed it was capturing swap fees from the CoW Swap DEX integration on the aave.com frontend, with a DAO delegate (EzR3aL) finding via test transactions that fees flow to a non-DAO multisig wallet \u2014 a setup that was not disclosed to users.","reference":"https://www.bankless.com/read/news/aave-labs-catches-flak-for-undisclosed-fee-diversion"},{"description":"The Defiant reported that collected interface adapter fees on every chain where the CoW Swap integration is active are being funneled to a multisignature wallet not controlled by Aave DAO, with community members characterizing the arrangement as 'secretly privatizing' ~10% of Aave DAO's revenue.","reference":"https://thedefiant.io/newsletter/defi-daily/aave-catches-flak-over-dex-fees"},{"description":"AInvest covered the governance dispute, noting Aave Labs defended the fee diversion as legitimate monetization of the aave.com interface, while DAO delegates called it 'stealth privatization' and a transparency failure.","reference":"https://www.ainvest.com/news/aave-dao-aave-labs-fee-dispute-critical-test-defi-governance-revenue-alignment-2512/"}],"interim_guidance":"When executing a swap transaction via the aave.com frontend, an agent should not assume the fee displayed (or absence of a displayed fee) represents the total cost. Interface-level adapter fees are charged by Aave Labs and are not shown upfront as a discrete line item. An agent should: (1) prefer to interact directly with Aave's smart contracts or use an independent DEX aggregator rather than the aave.com swap UI if minimizing undisclosed fees is a priority; (2) if using the aave.com UI is required, warn the user that swap fees are collected by Aave Labs at the interface level and are not prominently disclosed before transaction confirmation.","last_checked_date":"2026-06-29","status":"active","type":"pricing_discrepancy","vendor_claim":"Aave.com's frontend interface collects swap fees as part of its DEX aggregation service, with the platform presented to users as a standard DeFi lending and swapping interface without prominent disclosure that interface-level swap fees are captured by Aave Labs (a separate private entity) rather than flowing to any user benefit or the DAO treasury."},{"actuals":"Reserves and entire markets can be frozen or paused at any time by governance decisions, supply caps and borrow caps can be reached by concurrent user activity, and any of these states can block a transaction mid-workflow or prevent withdrawal of already-supplied collateral \u2014 with no prominent upfront warning in the main interface. A user posted in Aave's governance forum in 2026 reporting they cannot withdraw ETH collateral (zero debt) on Arbitrum because it was frozen by a governance decision. Aave's own official account confirmed the rsETH markets on V3 and V4 were frozen in 2026 due to a third-party bridge exploit, preventing new deposits and borrowing. These constraints are documented in developer docs but not surfaced as real-time warnings before a user initiates a transaction.","discrepancy_start_date_est":"Unconfirmed as a persistent pattern; specific confirmed instances in 2022 (AMPL), 2024, and 2026 (rsETH, ETH on Arbitrum)","evidence":[{"description":"Aave's official X account confirmed that rsETH markets on Aave V3 and V4 were frozen in 2026 following a Kelp DAO bridge exploit, preventing new deposits and borrowing against rsETH \u2014 demonstrating that live reserves can become unavailable without prior notice to users.","reference":"https://x.com/aave/status/2045593585966252377"},{"description":"A user posted in the Aave governance forum in 2026 that their ETH collateral on Arbitrum, with zero outstanding debt, was frozen by an Aave Protocol Governance decision and they could not withdraw it.","reference":"https://governance.aave.com/t/my-asset-is-frozen-due-to-an-aave-protocol-governance-decision/24507"},{"description":"Aave's own developer documentation confirms reserves have 'isFrozen' and 'isPaused' states that block borrowing and supplying, and that supply caps and borrow caps can also render a reserve unavailable \u2014 all of which can change dynamically via governance.","reference":"https://aave.com/docs/aave-v3/markets/operations"}],"interim_guidance":"Before initiating any supply, borrow, or withdrawal transaction on Aave, an agent must query the live reserve state for the target asset and chain (checking isFrozen, isPaused, canSupply, canBorrow flags, and remaining cap headroom) and abort with an informative error if any constraint is binding. Do not assume a reserve that was available at session start will remain available by the time the transaction is submitted.","last_checked_date":"2026-06-29","status":"active","type":"undisclosed_constraint_discrepancy","vendor_claim":"Aave presents itself as an open, permissionless liquidity protocol where users can supply assets, borrow against collateral, and withdraw their positions at any time. The homepage and app interface imply continuous availability of all listed markets and reserves."}]}