In the first quarter of the year, the crypto industry lost $336.3 million to hacking, 23.1% less than last year.
According to the Immunefi report, in the first three months of 2024, crypto projects lost more than $321 million due to 46 hacks and 15 fraudulent incidents.
Decentralized finance (defi) is a prime target for hackers, accounting for 100% of losses in the crypto industry. According to Immunefi CEO Mitchell Amador, defi suffers from frequent compromise of private keys.
“Particularly, the ecosystem has witnessed a significant volume of losses due to private key compromises, emphasizing the critical need to secure both code and protocol infrastructure.”
Mitchell Amador, Founder and CEO at Immunefi
The number of hacker attacks in the first quarter of 2024 decreased by 17.5% compared to the same period in 2023. Attackers often exploited the Ethereum (ETH) network, the victim of 33 incidents. The BNB Chain (BNB) blockchain saw the second-most attacks, having been exploited 14 times. Ethereum and BNB Chain accounted for over 73% of the lost funds.
The largest hacks were attacks on the Orbit Bridge and the Munchables web3 gaming platform. Attackers stole over $81 million from Orbit and almost $63 million from Munchables. The pair were followed by PlayDapp and FixedFloat, which lost $32 million and $26 million, respectively.
Hacking remains the industry’s most popular method of crypto theft, accounting for 95.6% of total losses, while fraud accounts for only 4.4%. According to analysts, fraud cases have decreased by 22.4% over the past 12 months.
In 2023, hackers pulled out $19 million from crypto projects, compared to $14 million this year. However, only 22% of the stolen funds were returned this year at $73 million.
Notably, the centralized finance (cefi) sector did not lose anything in the first three months of 2024, while during the same period last year, it lost $1.8 million.