The world’s leading provider of cyber security, Acronis, recently revealed that hackers stole $44 billion from cryptocurrencies and other forms of decentralized money between June 2021 and June 2022.
According to a press release posted on the company’s website, Acronis’ Cyber Protection Operation Centers have been hard at work on a study detailing the state of cyber threats since the beginning of the year.
An excerpt from the release read, “Cyberattacks have caused to a loss of more than $60bn in DeFi currency since 2012. In the past twelve months, $44 billion of that disappeared.
Acronis found that hackers were increasingly targeting cryptocurrency and distributed ledger technology (DeFi) networks.
The report went on to say that hackers have gained access to cryptocurrency wallets and exchanges by taking advantage of security holes in smart contracts or acquiring recovery phrases and passwords via malware or phishing attempts.
The research added that ransomware remained the primary threat to big, medium, and government organizations.
The research went on to say that “almost half of all reported breaches during the first half of 2022 featured stolen credentials, which enable phishing and ransomware campaigns.”
About 600 harmful email campaigns were reported throughout the internet in the first half of 2022, and it was also observed that the usage of phishing, malicious emails, and websites, and malware had continued to rise.
It added greater weight to the argument for all-encompassing methods of cyber defense.
Candid Wüest, Acronis’s vice president of cyber protection research, said, “Today’s cyberthreats are continually developing and escaping old security methods.
Anti-malware, email security, and vulnerability assessment capabilities must all be part of a comprehensive cybersecurity strategy for businesses of all sizes. Cybercriminals are become too intelligent, and the repercussions of attacks are getting too severe, for us to continue relying on simplistic, point-solution-based strategies.
