Explore the top 10 billion-dollar hacks in cryptocurrency exchanges from 2011 to 2023 in this revealing study.
Numerous characteristics of cryptocurrencies, such their level of decentralisation, transparency, and security, have drawn more and more attention. However, others have also sought to see how vulnerable they are, which has led to the development of cryptocurrency attacks.
A study on the subject covering the years 2011–2023 has included the top 10 billion-dollar cryptocurrency exchange hacks.
Crypto hacks: the analysis of billionaire assaults on virtual currency throughout the previous ten years
One aspect of cryptocurrencies that was the subject of analysis in this research was the billion-dollar hacks that had happened in the last ten years.
Basically, a lot of sources were examined in order to produce important statistics that illustrate the behaviour of hacker assaults on cryptocurrencies between 2011 and 2023.
Among the many findings, it was discovered that 297 cryptocurrency hacking attempts cost $1.89 billion in losses in 2023 alone. That means that this year’s cryptocurrency attacks have cost $289,000 every hour.
That staggering amount for the current year, however, is unrelated to the all-time high of $3.5 billion stolen in 284 theft cases in 2022.
Considering cryptocurrency exchanges as participants in the market, it would seem that 2018 was the worst year, with cryptocurrency trading platforms losing a total of $1.1 billion due to theft and hacking incidents.
Crypto hacking has also increased significantly on DeFi over the last two years.
Furthermore, it seems that cryptocurrency businesses and exchanges have lost a total of $12.36 billion in 1207 occurrences since 2011. Out of these, roughly 192 cryptocurrency exchanges have experienced hacking losses totaling $3.80 billion.
Then, when considering which cryptocurrencies are targeted by cyberattacks, Bitcoin and Ethereum immediately come to mind. In actuality, numerous hacks have resulted in a total loss of 1,454,762 BTC and 1,175,082 ETH since 2011.
The list includes the top ten cryptocurrency exchanges that have been hacked
Following is a list of the top 10 cryptocurrency exchanges that have been compromised by cyberattacks between 2011 and the present, based on data that has been made public.
The first-place theft is at Coincheck, a Japanese cryptocurrency exchange that looks to have had a $534 million cryptocurrency attack on January 26, 2018.
Next is the now-defunct Mt Gox cryptocurrency exchange, which was the target of a 2014 theft that cost $473 million.
FTX is also on the stage as the cryptocurrency exchange that was the victim of the third-largest breach in history. Early in the current year, January, FTX is said to have lost $415 million.
However, the rankings don’t stop there. In fact, the list includes BitMart, which was robbed of $200 million in ETH and BNB in 2021, Gate.io, which experienced a $234 million cryptocurrency theft in 2018, and KuCoin, which lost $281 million in 2020.
In 2019, hackers also stole $170 million from BitGrail, and in 2022, Maiar DEX experienced a cryptocurrency theft that cost $113 million.
The next two positions on the list are CoinBene, which purportedly experienced a $100 million cryptocurrency hack incident in 2019, and Japan’s Liquid crypto-exchange, which was plundered of $90 million in 2021.
Which cryptocurrency attacks have been the most significant in the last ten years?
Therefore, a further ranking aims to take into account the ten largest attacks on cryptocurrencies that take into account not just cryptocurrency exchanges but also all other market participants, including the blockchain networks itself.
The first one happened at the Ronin Network (Axie Infinity), where $625 million was stolen by a hacker. On March 29, 2022, Ronin Network, a blockchain network devoted to gambling, disclosed a loss of 25,000,000 USDC and 173,600 ETH, raising suspicions of a cryptocurrency hack of this kind.
The 2021 theft of Poly Network’s DeFi cross-chain platform is also included in the $600 million total value of stolen cryptocurrency. In contrast to the previous attacks, the hacker in this one got a job offer and a $500,000 prize for discovering a systemic vulnerability, but after some dramatic events, they returned all the money.
The well-known Binance Smart Chain was then the target of another cyber attempt in 2022, which cost it 2,000,000 BNB, or $566 million.
Thus, Huobi’s CEX, which Justin Sun, the creator of Tron, advises, recently experienced a situation comparable to that of Poly Network. In essence, 5,000 ETH, or $8 million at the time, were stolen from Huobi. Once more, though, it seems that the crypto hacker chose to give back the stolen funds in return for a 250 ETH white hat incentive, which was worth $400,000 at the time.
