A new study shows that the number of hacking attacks on NFT projects has quadrupled in the last year. In 2022, NFT users lost a total of $86.6 million.
Research firm Comparitech tracks hacker activity in the NFT market. Analysts have concluded that malicious activity in the sector has increased significantly over the past few years.
According to Comparitech, 150 targeted attacks on different NFT projects were conducted in 2022, and about $87 million worth of digital tokens were stolen. March was the most productive month this year for hackers when they managed to make 31 exploits in the NFT sector.
However, Comparitech’s figures do not include statistics about NFT thefts from private investors, as well as losses due to fraud and mistakes in the projects themselves. The statistics cover only data on exploits from public sources.
In total, hackers have already stolen 330% more from NFT users this year compared to last year. Comparitech analysts named the biggest attacks of the current year as:
- Lympo — in January 2022, a sports NFT minting platform lost 165.2 million LMT tokens, with an estimated $18.7 million in damage at the time of the attack.
- Bored Ape Yacht Club — in April 2022, hackers stole 10 NFTs worth $13.7 million by attacking BAYC’s Instagram account.
- DragonSB Finance — in April 2022, hackers attacked the project’s smart contracts and withdrew about $10 million.
- OpenSea — in February 2022, a phishing attack on the marketplace allowed hackers to withdraw NFTs worth 1,200 ETH, valued at $3.4 million at the time of the attack.
- TopGoal — in February 2022, hackers withdrew over 4.8 million TMT worth about $2.23 million.
- The Shifters — in March 2022, the project’s Discord was hacked, losing nearly $2 million worth of NFTs.
- Moonbirds — in May 2022, 29 Moonbirds were stolen via phishing, the amount of damage was estimated at $1.5 million.
Recall that Web 3.0 security analysts at TRM Labs recently reported that the number of phishing attacks on NFT projects via compromised Discord accounts has doubled, and they could all be related. CertiK analysts claim that social media is the most vulnerable area of Web 3.0.
Moreover, the NFT market has seen a significant drop in trading volume in recent months, even despite occasional bursts of user activity. So, according to the data by CryptoSlam, the trading volume decreased by 17% in June and by another 7% in July. In general, analysts have recorded a decline in monthly NFT turnover by about 94% over the past six months.
