Hacktober ended with $657 million in losses from crypto exploits

Last month was pretty scary for the crypto industry as it saw the highest number of DeFi hacks this year.

While October was expected to be “Uptober,” it quickly became “Hacktober” as cybercriminals ransacked the top crypto projects for hundreds of millions of dollars.

Hackers steal $760 million from DeFi protocols

A recent one chirping of blockchain security company PeckShield pointed out that October was the biggest month for hacking activities this year. The DeFi market suffered from 44 exploits affecting 53 protocols in the tenth month, with the hackers taking $760.2 million.

According to PeckShield, the largest amount of funds stolen came from the BNB Chain exploit that saw hackers wipe a whopping $586 million from the blockchain network. It was followed by Solana-based crypto lender, Mango Markets, which was leveraged for $100 million.

Hackers stole $15.8 million from crypto-vesting platform, Team Financeby taking advantage of a flaw in the version 2 to version 3 migration of the protocol.

$100 million of stolen funds recovered

PeckShield noted that hackers have already returned about $115 million of the stolen funds to exploited platforms in what could be called a silver lining among the many losses.

#PeckShieldAlert ~44 exploits (53 protocols affected) took ~$760.2 million in October 2022, and ~$100 million have already returned the exploited protocols (Total loss: $657.2 million)
As of October 2022, the stolen funds (~$3 billion) in 2022 “doubled” last year’s losses pic.twitter.com/mKZAjVk7UU

— PeckShieldAlert (@PeckShieldAlert) 31 October 2022

An example of this is the Mango Markets hacker, identified as Avraham Eisenburg. He claimed that his actions in the exploitation were legal.

After negotiations and community votes, Mango struck a deal with Eisenburg, which returned $67 million to the project and passed away with around 50 million dollars.

$3B stolen from DeFi in 2022 doubles 2021 losses

Last month’s series of hacks made 2022 a profitable year for hackers compared to last year. According to the PeckShield report, hackers have already made a whopping $3 billion in stolen funds, double the $1.5 billion worth of crypto assets lost in 2021.

Since the start of the year, the total value locked (TVL) in DeFi protocols has also been disappointing. TVL had fallen dramatically from over 150 billion dollars at the beginning of the year to approx 56 billion dollars.