Hacken analysts summed up cybersecurity and fraud incidents among crypto projects in 2023. Hackers managed to steal about $1.9 billion.
In just one year, 447 similar incidents were recorded in the cryptocurrency industry.. Compared to the previous year, the loss decreased significantly, but the number of incidents, on the contrary, increased.
“Compared to a loss of $52.3 billion in 2022, this seems to be a good trend. But a closer look paints a grim picture: the number of attacks and their complexity is growing,” experts write.
The largest hack in 2023, related to Multichain, did not even make it into the top 10 over the past two years in terms of damage.
Crypto projects managed to return up to 20% of the stolen funds, which is approximately $400 million. Successful negotiations and effective communication with hackers contributed to the return of stolen assets in most cases. The report mentions an example of the Euler Finance hack. The hacker stole about $200 million in cryptocurrency, but after negotiations he returned the funds to the project in full.
Recently, analysts from Arkham Intelligence found that North Korean hackers from the Lazarus group showed record activity – they transferred dozens of bitcoins from account to account or to a cryptomixer. In total, North Korean hackers have already transferred 27,371 BTC ($1.2 million) to the cryptocurrency mixer, and then sent 3,343 BTC to a previously used inactive address.