Over $1.5B Stolen in Top 5 Crypto Hacks in 2022: Forbes

A recent report by Forbes claims that over $3 billion was hacked from crypto projects this year. According to the research, there were over 125 hacks on cryptocurrency projects.

The top five crypto thefts—all of which included decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols—accounted for $1.48 billion of the total amount taken.

As per Forbes, reasons behind these thefts have included cross-chain hacking, code flaws, and flash loan attacks.

The top five hacks include the $625 million breach in Ronin Network, the $325 million theft in Wormhole, the $190 million hack in Nomad Bridge, the $182 million flash loan attack in Beanstalk Farms, and the $160 million exploit in Wintermute.

According to a Forbes study, hackers this year’s top target was cross-chain bridges, which allow tokens to be traded between blockchains. In 2022, crypto hackers will be responsible for 70% of all cryptocurrency theft, swiping around $2 billion from blockchain bridges.

The research claims that 49% of the total cash taken by crypto hackers in the year 2022, came through DeFi breaches. As a result, less money has been invested in the industry.

TVL Crashes

According to Elliptic, a London-based blockchain analytics firm, DeFi protocols nearly lost 75% of their total value locked (TVL) in 2022. Notably, Elliptic also revealed in November of last year, that a total of $12 billion of investor funds had been lost on DeFi systems.

DeFi Llama data also demonstrates a decline in TVL from DeFi protocols, from 166.58 billion at the beginning of 2022 to $39 billion in December.

DeFi protocols provide investment products that are similar to those offered by traditional banking, with applications governed by smart contracts. 

These products often come with greater interest rates than savings and loans. The use of DeFi by several blockchain platforms has drawn cybercriminals looking for exploits to defraud consumers of their money.