Immunefi Reports $1.8 Billion in Losses for Crypto Users Due to Hacks and Scams in 2023
In 2023, cryptocurrency users experienced a total loss of $1.8 billion due to hacks, exploits, scams, and rug pulls, as reported by bug bounty platform Immunefi on Thursday. Despite a 54% reduction from the $3.9 billion lost in 2022, the number of individual incidents surged by 90%, rising from 168 in 2022 to 319 in 2023.
The third quarter emerged as the most calamitous period, contributing one-third of the total losses for the year. Notably, November ($343 million), September ($340 million), and July ($320 million) saw the highest monthly losses.
Hacks accounted for the majority of losses, totaling $1.6 billion in 247 incidents, primarily associated with decentralized finance platforms. Fraud constituted $103 million lost across 110 incidents, according to Immunefi‘s report.
Of the stolen funds, approximately $231.7 million (13.5%) were successfully recovered in 19 cases. BNB Chain and Ethereum endured consistent attacks, representing over half of the total losses. BNB Chain witnessed 131 incidents, while Ethereum faced 91 incidents, followed by Polygon with ten and Avalanche with six incidents.
North Korea’s Lazarus Group successfully absconded with $308.6 million, making up 17.4% of the total losses for the year. The group was implicated in attacks on Atomic Wallet, CoinEx, Alphapo, Stake, and CoinsPaid.
Other significant incidents in 2023 included attacks on Mixin Network ($200 million), Euler Finance ($197 million), Multichain ($126 million), Poloniex ($126 million), and BonqDAO ($120 million), as highlighted by Immunefi.
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