According to the data analyzed by the Atlas VPN team, blockchain hackers stole $2.5 billion in three quarters of 2022. In total, hackers got away with nearly $483 million in Q3 2022. Despite that, blockchain hacks fell by 43% in the last quarter compared to Q2.
Even though the cryptocurrency market is in a deep slump, cybercriminals are still actively hacking blockchain technologies or launching scams.
The Ethereum ecosystem suffered the most significant losses of $348 million over 11 hacks. The cross-chain interoperability protocol Nomad bridge and crypto market Wintermute each lost about $160 million in crypto due to hacker attacks.
The Polkadot ecosystem takes second place on the most significant losses list. The Polkadot crypto projects lost $52 million in just 2 hack events. Next is the Binance Smart Chain (BSC) ecosystem, which was hacked 13 times and lost $28 million in crypto. Hackers attacked BSC-related crypto projects more than any other.
At the same time, the Solana ecosystem lost nearly $6 million worth of crypto in 3 hack events. Blockchain-related hacks caused $5.1 million in losses throughout 4 incidents. Cybercriminals hacked crypto exchanges three times and got away with $6.8 million. The Fantom ecosystem also suffered one hack event in which hackers stole $1.7 million.
Since the start of the year, the total cryptocurrency market cap has decreased by 58%. Most crypto prices have been falling for months, which caused cybercriminals to pull away from performing hacks. After the significant crypto crash in June, blockchain hacks continued to fall from 24 in July to 21 in August, and only 10 incidents in September.
Blockchain technology has been a great example of how security principles in financial transactions and information transmission are revolutionizing. Despite that, the technology is still susceptible to cybercriminals who exploit it for their benefit. Many crypto projects get hacked, or scammers set up rug pulls to steal from investors.