In 2023, the loss of encrypted assets due to hacker attacks decreased to $1.7 billion, a decrease of over 50% compared to the previous year.

Written by: Tyler Pearson, DL News Researcher

Translated by: Web3CN

The good news is: the value of encrypted assets lost due to hacker attacks in 2023 decreased by over 50% to $1.7 billion.

The bad news is: this is still a very large number, with the frequency of attacks (160 major hacker attacks) roughly the same as in 2022.

Smaller "Harvest" for Hackers

Ari Redbord, Global Policy and Government Affairs Director at TRM Labs, who provided data to DL News, stated that the proceeds of cybercriminals were smaller, "possibly due to law enforcement actions and better compliance controls, rather than a downturn in the crypto market."

According to DefiLlama's data, despite increased efforts to combat hackers, security vulnerabilities in the crypto space persisted until the end of the year. OKX DEX was attacked on December 13, 2023, resulting in a loss of approximately $2.7 million.

Since the $43 million hack at Stake.com in September last year, we have published a list of hackers, and there have been five more major hacking incidents, each large enough to push the Stake.com hack from the 5th to the 10th position.

Keep reading to see the top 10 cryptocurrency hacks of 2023 (note: the months mentioned below are all in 2023).

1. Mixin Network: $200 million

In September, hackers stole $200 million from user accounts at the Hong Kong exchange Mixin.

After the attack, DL News reported reviews by several industry insiders who found the attack suspicious, partly due to Mixin's lack of a cold wallet to ensure the security of customer funds.

Mixin founder Feng Xiaodong promised to compensate customers for half of their losses, and some token deposits and withdrawals have been restored, but Mixin's compensation plan remains unclear.

2. Euler Finance: $1.97 billion

In March, the lending protocol Euler Finance was attacked, with hackers stealing nearly $1.97 billion. The attackers exploited a vulnerability in Euler's donation function contract, but later returned most of the stolen funds.

3. Multichain: $1.26 billion

The cross-chain bridge protocol Multichain suffered a hacker attack in July when the project's private key was leaked. At the time, crypto research firm Chainalysis called it "one of the largest cryptocurrency hacks in history."

4. Poloniex: $1.26 billion

In November, hackers stole $1.26 billion from the cryptocurrency exchange Poloniex, and withdrawals were frozen after the funds were stolen.

According to DL News, actual owner Justin Sun planned to provide victims with an "epic airdrop" token as compensation for the hack.

Poloniex resumed deposit and withdrawal services for multiple assets on December 5.

5. Atomic Wallet: $1 billion

In June, users of Atomic Wallet were hacked, resulting in a $1 billion loss. Analysts accused the hackers of being associated with the Lazarus Group from North Korea. After the attack, angry investors filed a collective lawsuit against Atomic Wallet.

6. Heco Chain: $87 million

Similar to the November Poloniex hack, hackers attacked the hot wallet on the Heco Chain. Due to its relationship with HTX, HTX itself lost $12 million in the hack, and HTX investor Justin Sun included Heco Chain in his compensation commitment to victims of the hack.

7. Curve Finance: $62 million

DeFi protocol Curve Finance suffered multiple attacks, with hackers stealing nearly $62 million from multiple trading pools. The attacks began with an initial vulnerability, leading to several seemingly unrelated hackers stealing from multiple Curve trading pools.

8. CoinEx: $55 million

In September, hackers attacked CoinEx for $55 million, and the exchange attributed the platform's "abnormal withdrawals" to the hack. CoinEx froze withdrawals for several weeks and promised compensation to customers. The exchange later blamed the hack on a private key leak, allowing the attackers to access its hot wallet.

9. KyberSwap Elastic: $48 million

In November, while HTX and Poloniex were under attack, an attacker carried out an exceptionally complex hack on the multi-chain aggregator KyberSwap Elastic. The attacker then posted a frantic ultimatum on the Etherscan block explorer, demanding control of the protocol.

10. Stake.com: $41 million

The online crypto casino and sports betting platform Stake.com was hacked in September, with "the loss of funds is by no means insignificant, but this attack did not have a significant impact on Stake's operations," said co-founder Edward Craven after the attack. The FBI later attributed the attack to the Lazarus, a North Korea-related cybercrime organization.

2023 Top 10 WEB3 Theft Cases - Hacker attacks lead to over 50% drop in cryptocurrency assets, down to $1.7 billion in losses.