Crypto Theft Hits $370M in January as Phishing and Social Engineering Dominate Losses

Crypto related theft surged in January, with attackers stealing about $370.3 million through exploits and scams. Blockchain security firm CertiK said on Jan. 31 that it recorded 40 exploit and scam incidents during the month. The number of events remained moderate, but a single case accounted for the majority of losses.

Social Engineering and Phishing Drive Crypto Theft Cases

CertiK reported that roughly $284 million of the stolen funds came from one victim targeted because of a social engineering scam. The incident highlights how attackers are now manipulating users rather than breaching protocols directly.

Phishing scams accounted for $311.3 million in losses. These attacks typically involve fake websites, wallet prompts, or impersonation attempts that trick users into revealing private keys or signing malicious transactions.

The January total marks the largest monthly crypto theft figure since February 2025, when attackers stole about $1.5 billion. That month was heavily influenced by the $1.4 billion hack of crypto exchange Bybit, according to CertiK data.

Compared with recent periods, January’s losses rose more than 277% from January 2025, when stolen funds totaled $98 million. Losses also jumped 214% from December, which recorded $117.8 million in crypto theft.

Major Exploits Target DeFi Platforms

PeckShield, another blockchain security firm, said Sunday that the largest protocol level hack in January was the attack on Step Finance. The decentralized finance portfolio tracker lost about $28.9 million after several treasury wallets were compromised. Attackers stole more than 261,000 Solana tokens during the incident.

The second largest exploit occurred on Jan. 8, when the Truebit protocol was attacked for $26.4 million. PeckShield said a flaw in a smart contract allowed an attacker to mint tokens at nearly no cost, triggering a sharp decline in the price of the TRU token.

Other notable incidents included a $13.3 million hack on liquidity provider SwapNet on Jan. 26 and a $7 million exploit targeting the Saga blockchain protocol on Jan. 21.

PeckShield said there were 16 protocol hacks in total during January, resulting in $86.01 million in losses. While this figure was down 1.42% compared with the same month last year, it represented a rise of more than 13% from December, showing that attack activity remains elevated across the crypto sector.