{"id":40232,"date":"2026-01-18T12:12:51","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T12:12:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/?p=40232"},"modified":"2026-01-18T12:12:51","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T12:12:51","slug":"report-crypto-scams-hacks-drained-over-4b-in-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/?p=40232","title":{"rendered":"Report: Crypto Scams, Hacks Drained Over $4B in 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> \n<br \/><\/p>\n<p>Crypto-related scams and hacks drained more than $4.04 billion from users and platforms in 2025, according to data shared by blockchain security firm PeckShield.<\/p>\n<p>The figures point to a clear shift toward targeted social engineering and attacks on centralized players, with scams alone rising far faster than technical exploits.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"scams-and-centralized-attacks-drove-2025-losses\">Scams and Centralized Attacks Drove 2025 Losses<\/h2>\n<p>PeckShield said total crypto losses in 2025 <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/PeckShieldAlert\/status\/2010960699766563200?s=20\">rose<\/a> about 34% from 2024, with $2.67 billion tied to hacks and $1.37 billion linked to scams.<\/p>\n<p>Scam losses jumped roughly 64% year-on-year, outpacing the growth in direct protocol exploits. However, the larger issue was higher per-case losses, often tied to tailored phishing and impersonation campaigns targeting high-value individuals.<\/p>\n<p>More than 200 hack incidents were recorded during the year, excluding scams. February accounted for the largest single-month loss on record after a $1.51 billion breach at Bybit, which PeckShield now ranks as the largest hack in crypto history. The FBI later <a href=\"https:\/\/cryptopotato.com\/fbi-links-1-5-billion-bybit-hack-to-north-koreas-lazarus-group\/\">linked<\/a> that attack to North Korea\u2019s Lazarus Group, detailing their use of malware and social engineering to gain access to Bybit\u2019s cold wallets.<\/p>\n<p>According to PeckShield&#8217;s data, attackers also started changing their approach last year. Instead of just targeting decentralized finance (DeFi) systems, they started focusing more on centralized exchanges and large organizations, which made up 75% of the money stolen last year, up from 46% in 2024.<\/p>\n<p>BNB Chain saw the highest number of incidents, while Ethereum accounted for the most dollar value lost due to large targets.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"a-look-at-patterns-and-recovery\">A Look at Patterns and Recovery<\/h2>\n<p>The report also provided context on how the stolen funds were moved. Tracked laundering linked to major exploits reached $1.49 billion in 2025, a 15% increase from the previous year, with PeckShield connecting the rise to the larger sums taken in individual heists.<\/p>\n<p>On a positive note, approximately $334.9 million of stolen crypto was recovered or frozen by authorities and security firms last year. However, that recovery rate was lower than the $488.5 million recovered in 2024, suggesting the scale and complexity of thefts are outpacing mitigation efforts.<\/p>\n<p>Recent data offers a mixed outlook. A separate report from PeckShield on January 3, 2026, noted that losses from exploits <a href=\"https:\/\/cryptopotato.com\/crypto-exploits-decline-sharply-with-only-76m-stolen-in-december-2025\/\">fell<\/a> to $76 million in December 2025, a 60% drop from November. However, the new year began with a major breach, as the Truebit protocol <a href=\"https:\/\/cryptopotato.com\/truebit-suffers-26-5m-loss-in-first-major-defi-hack-of-2026\/\">lost<\/a> $26.5 million in an exploit on January 9.<\/p>\n<p>This ongoing cycle of attacks is a reminder that while monthly totals may fluctuate, the underlying threats of infrastructure vulnerabilities and personalized scams remain persistent challenges for the crypto ecosystem.<\/p>\n<p>Together, the cases support PeckShield\u2019s view that 2025\u2019s losses were less about random exploits and more about precision targeting, where social engineering and access to centralized systems played a growing role.<\/p>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https:\/\/cryptopotato.com\/report-crypto-scams-hacks-drained-over-4b-in-2025\/\">Report: Crypto Scams, Hacks Drained Over $4B in 2025<\/a> appeared first on <a href=\"https:\/\/cryptopotato.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow\">CryptoPotato<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/cryptopotato.com\/report-crypto-scams-hacks-drained-over-4b-in-2025\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Crypto-related scams and hacks drained more than $4.04 billion from users and platforms in 2025, according to data&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3932,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-crypto","cs-entry","cs-video-wrap"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40232"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40232\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}