Hackers stole more than twice as much cryptocurrency in the first half of 2024 as they did a year earlier, according to a report by analytics firm TRM Labs.
The size of thefts in January-June amounted to $1.38 billion compared to $657 million in the same period last year.
As a year earlier, the bulk of the volume was stolen in a small number of attacks. Five hacks allowed hackers to steal 70% of the total semiannual volume.
The largest of these was the hack of Japanese crypto exchange DMM Bitcoin, in which attackers stole more than $300 million worth of bitcoins.
That said, there were no fundamental changes in the security of the cryptocurrency ecosystem that could have contributed to the increase in thefts, TRM notes. The number of attacks has also not changed significantly over the year.
However, the average value of cryptocurrencies rose in the first half of the year, which may have affected the dollar valuation of thefts.
