In this article from Digital Currency Signal, we present to you the biggest hacks in the history of digital currency. Paying attention to the security market and being cautious is a must for users of this market. If you ignore safety and security precautions and carelessly risk your cryptocurrency in the market, chances are you will also face this cyber attack and lose your cryptocurrency and capital in the market. For many analysts and investors in the cryptocurrency market, the loss of the Luna digital currency network is still hard to believe. The digital currency, which was recently one of the top ten digital currencies in the world, and many users were willing to invest in it, is no more and has been destroyed. Paying attention to the risks of digital currency forces you to use all the necessary security points in your transactions. Knowing the biggest digital currency hack is one of the pieces of information that can make your mind more alert and aware.
The biggest hacks and thefts in the history of cryptocurrencies
According to elders and experts, the traditional financial sector needs to learn the lesson that it took centuries to learn in a few short years the cryptocurrency trading and trading ecosystem. But since last year’s biggest hack in the history of digital currency, it seems that there is still a long way to go before it evolves properly. Chris Caruana, vice president of anti-money laundering at financial crime platform Feedzai, said: “Traditional finance companies grew up knowing the need for multiple layers of security and protection. Digital exchanges, which are the heart of the ecosystem, have not yet been forced to take such steps.
In recent years, hackers have discovered weaknesses and flawed codes in smart contracts, exchange systems, decentralized programs, and other cases with various methods of digital currency fraud and have stolen huge amounts of money. In this episode, we take a look at the biggest hacks and thefts in the history of digital currencies.
What are the biggest cryptocurrency hacks?
1. Ronin Network’s largest cryptocurrency hack: $625 million
The largest crypto hack to date occurred in March 2022 and focused on the network supporting the popular blockchain gaming platform OxyInfinity. Hackers broke into the Ronin network and made off with about $625 million worth of Ethereum and USD coins. US officials said the hacking group Lazaro, which is backed by the North Korean government, was involved in the attack. A month later, Binance was able to recover 5.8 million dollars of the stolen funds, but this theft is still considered the biggest hack in the history of cryptocurrency.
2. Second largest crypto hack on the Poly network: $611 million
In August 2021, a single hacker attacked a security hole in the Poly Network financial sharing platform and made more than 600 million dollars. The developers of the project issued a request on Twitter to return the stolen funds, including $ 33 million in Tether. The poly network then created several refund addresses and the anonymous hacker began cooperating. Two days later, almost $300 million was found, and it was revealed that hackers had targeted the network as a prank or challenge.
3. Binance: 570 million dollars
In one of the biggest attacks in cryptocurrency history, the Binance exchange was hacked in October 2022 and $570 million was stolen. A cross-chain bridge (a way to transfer tokens from one network to another) called BSC Token Hub was exploited by hackers and led to the creation of a redundant Binance Coin (BNB) and the withdrawal of 2 million of this token. It should be noted that Binance Coin is the native token of this digital currency. As mentioned earlier, a flaw in the project’s smart contract enabled this hack and reminded all activists in the field that blockchain has security flaws and needs to be fixed.
4. 4th biggest crypto hack on Coincheck (Coincheck): $534M
In January 2018, the Japanese exchange Coincheck was hacked for approximately $534 million. This security hole is created with a hot wallet, which is not as secure as an offline cold wallet. At the time, Coincheck hacked the famous exchange Mt. Gox. At the time, some crypto activists described it as the biggest heist in world history. Coincheck Exchange Survived Hack And Still Running Although it was acquired by Japanese financial services company Manx a few months later,
5. Mt Gox: $473 million
The first major cryptocurrency hack occurred in 2011 when cryptocurrency exchange Matt Gox lost 25,000 bitcoins worth about $400,000.At the time, this crypto exchange handled nearly 70% of all Bitcoin transactions. Of course, this was not the end of the story and the Met Gox exchange was attacked again in 2014. That year, the exchange lost about 650,000 bitcoins of its clients and about 100,000 of its bitcoins. At the time, this amount was 7% of all mined bitcoins and was worth about $473 million. It was initially unclear why the coins went missing, but later evidence showed they were stolen from the company’s hot wallets.
6. Wormhole: $ 325 million
The platform was hit by a botched wormhole in February 2022 that stole $325 million from investors. A Wormhole is a blockchain bridge that allows the transfer of assets such as NFTs and tokens from one blockchain to another. The hacker was able to run the wormhole contract and, since he did not have Ethereum on the Solana network, pretended to have an Ethereum balance, thus transferring and withdrawing 120,000 Ethereum units from the Ethereum blockchain. This event upset the Solana community, caused the price of Solana to drop by almost 10%, and caused the DeFi ecosystem to collapse. Jump Trading quickly recovered the bridge and replaced the lost 120,000 Ethereum. This allowed the bridge to be damaged and continue to function as before with minimal side effects.
7. Bitmart: $196 million
In December 2021, Bitmart’s centralized headquarters was hacked and it suffered a loss of $196 million. This hack was first noticed by a security firm that noticed that the balance of the Bitmart address had dropped to zero. About $100 million was mined from various digital currencies through the Ethereum network, and another $96 million was mined through the Binance smart network. Etherscan forwards all tokens to an address called “Bitmart Hacker”.
✅final word
Financial hacking and fraud have always been hidden, and so far in the history of digital currencies, we have witnessed the theft of cryptocurrencies from exchanges, wallets, smart contracts, and crypto projects, all caused by security flaws and incorrect software coding. However, crypto companies continually try to improve their security barriers by implementing security measures and testing for bugs.
