Hey guys! I want to tell you about how last year scammers stole a huge amount of cryptocurrency â 494 million dollars. This money was stolen from the crypto wallets of more than 300,000 users.
At first glance, it seems that there are more victims, but their number has increased by only 3.7%. But the stolen amount increased by 67%! This means that people had more money in their wallets.
How does all this happen?
Scammers use clever phishing attacks. Imagine fake websites or hacked pages â you visit them without suspecting anything, and they steal your wallet data. These tools are called "wallet hijackers".
Most of these attacks occur during times of market growth, for example, when cryptocurrency prices rise sharply. In 2024, $187 million was stolen in the first quarter (at the height of the bitcoin price increase).
The biggest attacks
There are services such as Scam Sniffer that monitor the activity of scammers. They noticed that there were as many as 30 major thefts in 2024, each exceeding $1 million. The biggest theft brought the attackers 55.4 million dollars.
Later in the year, there was a case with the fraudulent Pink Drainer service, which even posed as journalists! This service used phishing attacks through Discord and Twitter. However, in the second quarter, he announced his closure, but the scammers immediately switched to other schemes.
Who dominated the "market"?
In the second half of 2024, the Inferno service became more active, stealing $110 million in August and September alone.
In the fourth quarter, Acedrainer became the leader, capturing 20% of the drainage systems market.
Which cryptocurrencies have been affected the most?
The biggest losses were related to Ethereum (85.3%, or 152 million dollars). And the most vulnerable assets:
Staking accounts for 40.9% of all stolen funds.
Stablecoins â 33.5%.
How do scammers work?
Scammers are improving their methods. In 2024, they used:
Fake CAPTCHA and Cloudflare pages.
IPFS (decentralized storage) for lock evasion.
Fake Google Ads and Twitter ads to lure users.
Protection Tips
Here's what you can do to avoid becoming a victim:
Check the URLs before visiting the site. Use only official sources.
Carefully read the requests for permissions and confirmation of transactions in the wallet.
Simulate transactions before executing them â this will help you see what actually happens.
Use the built-in warnings in your wallet. They often show if a transaction is suspicious.
Revoke permissions to use tokens using special tools.
Now you know how scammers work and how to protect yourself. Take care of your assets and be careful!
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