The cryptocurrency industry saw a significant decline in losses from scams, exploits, and hacks as 2024 came to a close.
December marked the least damaging month of the year, with $28.6 million in recorded losses, down sharply from $63.8 million in November and $115.8 million in October, according to blockchain security firm CertiK.
CertiK revealed in a December 31 update on X that exploits accounted for the majority of these losses, totaling $26.7 million.
GemPad Suffered $2M in Losses
The most notable incidents included a $2.1 million exploit on decentralized finance (DeFi) platform GemPad. Attackers leveraged a smart contract vulnerability to steal assets.
Additionally, the token bridge of another DeFi project, FEG, was exploited, resulting in a $1 million loss. CertiK attributed the breach to an error in FEG’s cross-chain message verification process.
Another blockchain security firm, PeckShield, reported similar findings. On January 1, PeckShield disclosed that December’s hack-related losses were $24.7 million—a 71% decline from November.
The firm identified over 25 hacks in the month, with the December 16–17 LastPass exploit being the most severe.
The incident drained $12.3 million from users’ wallets. The breach traced back to a December 2022 data backup theft, which has continued to cause cryptocurrency thefts throughout 2024.
PeckShield also highlighted a December 2 security breach involving DeFi market protocol Yei Finance, which lost $2.2 million.
$2.3 Billion Stolen in 2024
Looking at the broader picture, the Cyvers 2024 Web3 Security Report revealed that $2.3 billion worth of cryptocurrency was stolen across 165 incidents in 2024, marking a 40% increase from 2023’s total of $1.69 billion.
However, this figure remains 37% below the $3.78 billion stolen in 2022.
Meanwhile, a report by blockchain security platform Immunefi claimed that the crypto industry witnessed losses totaling $1.49 billion in 2024 due to hacks and fraud, marking a 17% decrease from 2023.
The report detailed that hacks were overwhelmingly the primary cause, accounting for $1.47 billion or 98.1% of the total losses across 192 incidents.
Fraud, including rug pulls and scams, represented just 1.9% of the losses at $28 million, though this category saw a 72% increase year-on-year.
The report identified two high-profile incidents as the year’s largest losses.
Japan’s DMM Bitcoin exchange suffered a $305 million private key breach in May, while WazirX, India’s top crypto exchange, lost $235 million in July after hackers compromised its Ethereum-based multisig wallet.
Together, these two events accounted for 36% of the total losses.
Decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols remained prime targets, representing 51.4% of the losses, while centralized finance (CeFi) platforms accounted for 48.6%.
Notably, CeFi losses surged by 77.5% year-on-year, reaching $726 million.
Ethereum and Binance Smart Chain were the most attacked blockchains, with Ethereum facing 104 incidents that led to 44% of total chain losses.
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