Data from blockchain research firm TRM Labs show that between January 1, and June 24, 2024, hackers have looted over $1.38 billion worth of crypto and counting. In comparison, that is more than double of $657 million from last year’s heists during the same period.
Like last year, these were no small-scale hacks as the top five hacks account for 70% of the amount stolen in the year’s first half. The current largest crypto heist of the year saw the theft of over $300 million worth of bitcoin from a Japanese crypto exchange, DMM Bitcoin.
According to TRM Labs, the top two attack vectors 2024 include seed phrases and private key compromises. A seed phrase is a sequence of random words that stores the information required to access a crypto wallet.
Hackers use stolen private keys or address poisoning to send a small amount of crypto to the victim from a wallet with a similar-looking address designed to mimic the victim’s or recipient’s.
They hope to trick the unsuspecting victim into sending funds to the wrong wallet. So far, Crypto exchanges have been the major victims, and targets, of these hacks and cyberattacks.
There have been no fundamental changes in the crypto ecosystem’s security that are contributing to the increase The number of attacks and vectors is not entirely different in comparison year after year.
TRM Labs.
In 2014, Mt. Gox experienced the largest crypto heist ever recorded. After a series of hacks, hackers robbed the firm of up to 950,000 bitcoins, worth over $54 billion today, causing Mt. Gox to file for bankruptcy in 2014.
In November 2023, the HTX exchange and Heco Chain suffered a theft of about $115 million. To be on the safe side, secured, and near perfection (just about perfect), crypto firms can protect themself against hacks and exploits using multi-layered defense system, including regular, robust encryption and security Audits, says TRM Labs.