Well, essentially, July 2024 turned out to be a troubling month for the crypto world. I've been following the blockchain security scene rather closely, and the statistics that are coming out are quite alarming. According to PeckShield, a well-known blockchain security firm, hackers made off with a whopping $266 million in just 16 incidents. That is a lot of digital assets going to waste!
One that really shocked me was the WazirX hack. It hit this Indian crypto exchange hard, and it lost a staggering $230 million. I've heard reports that this notorious Lazarus Group, allegedly sponsored by North Korea, could be behind this one. Isn't that alarming? State-sponsored hackers have now set their sights on crypto exchanges. WazirX's response was notable – they suspended operations and offered a $23 million bounty to recover the funds. I'm not sure how effective that'll be, but I guess it's worth an attempt.
What really caught my attention was how these hackers are getting more sophisticated. Many of them now use crypto-mixing services like Tornado Cash to cover their tracks. Quite the high-tech game of cat and mouse. More specifically, I'm concerned about the Compound protocol nearly falling victim to a governance attack worth $24 million. That shows, even in highly advanced systems, there might always be some vulnerabilities exposed.
I do find it somewhat encouraging that some of the smaller platforms were able to recover a portion of their funds. For example, RhoMarkets and DeltaPrime got back quite a significant amount of what they lost. That has given me a glimmer of hope: not everything is lost when such attacks do occur. The mere presence of names on the list, such as Terra and Bittensor, is a bit disconcerting. These are projects that I've been keeping an eye on, so it's disappointing to see them get hit.
Comparing the numbers with those of June, one thing I can sense is that this month seems to have an increase in frequency and scale. It just seems these hackers are getting bolder and more skilled month after month. I do somewhat feel like this is going to be the new reality in crypto now.
The thing that really concerns me is the exit scams. According to CertiK, nearly $3 million was lost to them in July alone. It's no longer just tech vulnerabilities, it's outright fraud. I now scrutinize carefully which projects I'm going to trust my investment with.