July crypto hacks total $266M, WazirX leads losses

In July, online hackers stole around $266 million from the cryptocurrency ecosystem and its investors through 16 separate attacks.

On July 18, Indian crypto exchange WazirX lost over $230 million to a major hack — representing 86.4% of the total crypto lost to hacks in the month. After independent investigations, the hack was attributed to North Korean hackers, based on the patterns and techniques of the exploit.

An overview of total damage in July

Blockchain investigation firm PeckShield reported that the stolen WazirX funds, totaling 61,154 Ether (ETH), remain under the hacker’s control as of Aug. 1.

Other prominent crypto hack victims in July include algorithmic protocol Compound Finance ($24 million), bridging protocol Li​.Fi protocol ($10 million), decentralized AI protocol Bittensor and liquidity provider Rho Markets ($8 million each).

In most cases, hackers have moved the stolen funds to crypto mixer Tornado Cash to evade detection and any possibility of tracing back the loot.

In contrast to July hacks, June recorded a comparatively lower loss of $176 million in crypto hacks spread across approximately 20 incidents.

Centralized crypto entities are biggest target

On the last of July, the infamous Terra blockchain temporarily halted at block height 11430400 following a hack that drained $6 million.

By exploiting a known vulnerability, the Terra hacker stole 60 million ASTRO (ASTRO), 500,000 USD (USDT), 3.5 million USD Coin (USDC) and 2.7 Bitcoin (BTC).

The Terra developers completed an emergency chain upgrade before resuming block production on the same day. The company update stated:

“Validators holding over 67% of the voting power on Terra have upgraded their nodes to prevent the exploit from recurring. More validators are expected to upgrade soon.”

According to Deddy Lavid, the co-founder and CEO of Web3 security firm Cyvers, centralized finance (CeFi) entities are the largest target for cryptocurrency hackers in 2024.

Previously speaking to Cointelegraph, he said that “attacks against smart contract-based projects are on the rise” as well. Lavid added that the biggest security vulnerabilities today stem from both the code and personal negligence.