$313 million in crypto lost to hackers and phishing in August

In August 2024, the cryptocurrency sector saw a notable rise in financial losses due to hacking and phishing incidents.

A report by blockchain security firm PeckShield revealed that the industry lost $313.86 million across more than ten incidents during the month.

This represents an 18% increase in losses compared to July, when the total was $266 million across 16 events.

Phishing attacks were responsible for the majority of the losses, totaling over $293 million.

Two major hacks significantly contributed to this figure.

One prominent incident occurred on August 19, where a whale lost approximately 4,064 Bitcoin (CRYPTO:BTC), valued at about $238 million, to a phishing attack.

The stolen Bitcoin was moved across various platforms, including THORChain (CRYPTO:RUNE), KuCoin (CRYPTO:KCS), and Railgun (CRYPTO:RAIL).

In another attack, a whale lost over $55 million in Dai (CRYPTO:DAI) stablecoin, affecting the fourth-largest DeFi protocol, Maker.

The stolen funds were converted to Ethereum (CRYPTO:ETH), and the attacker’s address showed no remaining assets.

On August 6, Ronin Network (CRYPTO:RON) experienced a transaction of 4,000 ETH, worth $10 million.

This transaction was exploited by whitehat hackers rather than fraudulent actors, who highlighted a bug related to Maximum Extractable Value.

Ronin Network has since offered a $500,000 reward as a bug bounty.

Other significant hacks in August included an unauthorised transaction of $5.1 million and Nexera’s $1.8 million exploit.

These incidents ranked fourth and fifth in terms of impact, respectively.

The rise in hacking activities emphasizes the ongoing risks in the crypto space, underlining the need for improved security measures and vigilance.