In December, the cryptocurrency industry experienced a substantial financial setback, losing millions of dollars due to malicious activities. This marked December as the fifth-highest month for hacks in 2023. According to the blockchain security firm PeckShield, the most recent incident involved an attack on Orbit Chain’s cross-chain bridge, contributing to the overall loss of approximately $100 million.
Crypto Heist: Cybercriminals Grabbed Nearly 100 Million Dollars in December
On December 31, the cross-chain bridge of Orbit Chain fell victim to a significant crypto exploit, resulting in the unfortunate loss of millions of dollars owned by users. The attackers took advantage of a vulnerability within the protocol, gaining unauthorized access to the ecosystem. In this exploit, they made off with various digital assets, including Tether (USDT), USD Coin (USDC), Ethereum (ETH), Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC), and Dai (DAI), totaling $82 million.
PeckShield reported that the stolen funds contributed to the cumulative losses in December, reaching nearly $100 million. This incident not only stood out as the most significant exploit for the month but also ranked as the 9th top hack targeting a cross-chain bridge in the past three years.
The decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol’s team, responsible for creating the bridge connecting various chains, confirmed the $82 million hack in a post on X (formerly Twitter). On January 1, 2024, they announced that they are actively investigating to uncover the root cause of the exploit. Additionally, the Orbit Chain developers revealed that they have engaged law enforcement agencies in an effort to trace the hackers and potentially freeze the stolen funds.
Hacks Drain Billions from the Financial Ecosystem in 2023
In 2023, numerous decentralized finance platforms fell victim to exploitation, resulting in substantial losses, with platforms like Multichain, Euler Finance, Mixin Network, and Atomic Wallet being among the targets.
Mixin experienced a significant exploit, losing $200 million, while Euler, Multichain, Poloniex, and Atomic Wallet suffered exploits amounting to $197 million, $125 million, $120 million, and $100 million, respectively.
According to insights from the blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs, the cryptocurrency space endured an overall loss of around $1.7 billion due to the activities of hackers, scammers, and thieves.
In a November 2023 report, Coinspeaker highlighted an alarming development where hackers siphoned off approximately $500 million from the crypto ecosystem over a span of 1172 days.
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