Hackers diverted $313 million through Phishing and other crypto scams in August 2024

Hackers diverted $313 million through Phishing and other crypto scams, The amount lost to bad actors in the crypto industry significantly increased in the month of August with over $313 million lost to crypto scams in the month.

The data was revealed by Blockchain security firm Peckshield and the information was shared on their X page.

Peckshield in its announcement gave the number of high-profile scams that occurred during the month while also detailing the specific type of scams carried out.

”#PeckShieldAlert August 2024 witnessed 10+ hacks in the crypto space, resulting in ~$313.86 million in losses.

The 2 largest hacks, both involving unauthorized transfers (#Phishing), accounted for 93.5% of the total stolen funds, amounting to $293.4 million.

 Top 5 Hackers Activities in August 2024

• Phishing: $238 million (#BTC)
• Phishing: $55.4 million (#DAI)
• Ronin: $12 million (Returned)
• Unauthorized Transfer: $5.1 million
• Nexera: $1.83 million

The latest figures show an 18% increase in total assets lost to bad actors since the month of July. Last month, Crypto and decentralized finance companies lost $266 million to hackers spread across 16 hacking events.

Crypto Whales on the Trail of Hackers

The Peckshield report revealed that hackers are mostly going after crypto whales in their illicit activities. Crypto whales are large holders of cryptocurrency assets whose onchain activities can influence the price of crypto assets.

The largest hack for the month of August belongs to a crypto whale that lost 4,064 Bitcoin worth about $238 million to a phishing attack on August 19. The attacker soon moved the funds to various crypto platforms including THORChain, KuCoin and Railgun.

Another Crypto whale lost over $55 million worth of DAI stablecoin to a phishing attack, on Aug 6th Ronin Network witnessed an unauthorized transfer of 4000 eth worth about $10 million. Luckily for the network, the attack was engineered by White hat hackers who returned the money and explained the vulnerability they exploited to the Network.

Another unauthorized transaction worth $5.1 million and Nexera’s $1.8 million exploit landed the fourth and fifth spots among the largest hacks in August according to the Peckshield report.

2 Points You Need To Know:

1. The most common type of crypto scams remains Phishing attacks, Pig butchering schemes, Rug pulls and Exit scams. Phishing scams involve fraudulently obtaining the password details of a network using cloned sites. It is also a common scam in the world of internet fraud where it is the leading strategy for Business Email compromise (BEC) scams.
2. Pig butchering scams are long term scams where the scammer takes time to build a long-term relationship with the prospective victim. After gaining the trust of the victims, the victims are often coerced to invest in fraudulent investment schemes where they lose their crypto assets.