Immunefi, a leading security and bug-hunting platform for the Web3 ecosystem, plays a crucial role in protecting the crypto community by regularly assessing the volume of funds lost due to hacks and scams. The platform is known for its large community of whitehat hackers who meticulously examine blockchain and smart contract code, identify vulnerabilities, and responsibly disclose them. These ethical hackers are rewarded by Immunefi based on the severity of the issues they discover, providing a strong incentive for experts to scrutinize the project’s code and contribute to making the crypto space safer.
In the August 2024 edition of its “Crypto Losses” report, Immunefi revealed some alarming statistics about the losses the crypto community has faced so far this year. According to the report, the total funds lost to hacks and scams in 2024 so far stood at $1,210,741,330 across 154 specific incidents. This figure marks a 15.5% increase compared to the same period in 2023, when losses stood at $1,048,044,942. However, August 2024 showed a significant drop in losses, with $15,082,000 reported lost to hacks and fraud across five incidents. This amount represents the lowest monthly loss of the year, showing a decrease of 38% compared to August 2023, when losses were recorded at $24,581,220, and a spectacular decrease of 94.5% compared to the previous month.
The report highlights that the majority of August’s losses were attributed to two specific projects: Ronin Network and Nexera. Ronin Network, a blockchain designed to optimize transactions for gaming applications like Axie Infinity, suffered a loss of $12 million. Nexera, a DeFi protocol, suffered a loss of $1.5 million. These two incidents accounted for the majority of August’s total losses.
In a notable trend, DeFi (decentralized finance) continued to outperform CeFi (centralized finance) in terms of lost funds, with all five incidents reported in August occurring in the DeFi space. This trend reflects the increasing focus of hackers on DeFi projects, which accounted for 100% of the total funds lost for the month. There were no incidents reported within CeFi during this period.
Hacking incidents remained the leading cause of losses, with no fraud events recorded in August 2024. The report highlights that all losses were due to hacking incidents, totaling $15,082,000 across the five cases.
The August report also identified the most targeted blockchain networks. Ethereum and BNB Chain were the top targets, with Ethereum experiencing three attacks accounting for 60% of the total losses on the targeted chains. BNB Chain experienced two incidents, accounting for the remaining 40% of the losses.
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