Crypto Thefts On The Rise As More Than $2.2 Billion Stolen From Various Platforms in 2024

A new report by Chainalysis is shedding light on the growing rise of crypto theft incidents. In 2024 alone, more than $2.2 billion worth of crypto was stolen from these apps.

This is not the first time that such alarming reports made the air. It’s in fact the fifth time in the past decade that we’re hearing about more than $1B getting stolen. In other years, the number of theft reportings rose in 2018, 2021, 2022, and even 2023.

Another very interesting point in this report has to do with Chainalysis seeing the trend where crypto was stolen from in terms of exact location. It was commonly observed that DeFi platforms were a prime target for stealing including in the first quarter of this year. Meanwhile, during the second and third quarters, the focus tends to shift to centralized apps. Some noteworthy mentions include DMM Bitcoin and the WazirX where nearly $305M and $234M were stolen.

The growing rise in attacks on these apps has brought to attention another very interesting point related to private security features. Most of these hacking incidents arose due to compromised private keys that gave hackers the greatest access to such funds. So to prevent such thefts, apps must take this into consideration and better security.

There is another notable mention of countries like North Korea which is to blame for a huge number of crypto theft incidents. The country might be closed but it ended up stealing close to $1.3B worth of valuable crypto assets this year from a whopping 47 different incidents.

This is a massive 61% growth in crypto theft in 2024 alone and the matter made up more than 20% of all such incidents. It’s quite sophisticated in terms of its tactics and it uses them to produce nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.

Remember, Bitcoin’s price continues to hit new highs in the past couple of weeks and hacks keep rising as it’s a simple way for many to make revenue. This is why platforms should invest in building up users’ trust through better security measures or it can be uneventful for all involved.

This is why the report highlights crypto regulatory networks and the need to keep getting better. With the right law enforcement in place and resources, the industry can become more trustworthy.

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by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World