It seems that two groups could be responsible for the bulk of hacking attacks on cryptocurrency exchanges to date as per a new research report which was published recently.

A blockchain analysis software firm known as Chainalysis released their report on Monday which stated that two “prominent, professional” hacking groups are the culprits behind as much as 60% of all the publicly reported crypto exchange hacks to date which amounts to around a hefty %1 billion in total.

The report states:

“On average, the hacks we traced from the two prominent hacking groups stole $90 million per hack. The hackers typically move stolen funds through a complex array of wallets and exchanges in an attempt to disguise the funds’ criminal origins.”

The firm has dubbed the two criminal groups as Alpha and Beta with the former being a “giant, tightly controlled organisation partly driven by nonmonetary goals,” and the latter being a “less organized and smaller organization absolutely focused on the money.”

Chainalysis backed their argument by analysing the crypto transactions carried out by both groups and discovered that Alpha moves funds in a fast manner after stealing them, with an “extremely high” average number of movements of funds with one example of their hacks featuring as many as 15 000 transfers. Furthermore, the group also converts as much as 75% of funds stolen to cash within a 30-day window.

On the other hand, Beta seems to be slow in comparison and holds stolen crypto assets for 6 -18 months before cashing out, as per the report. When Beta decides on cashing out they usually quickly hit one exchange and will cash out over 50% of stolen funds within days of stealing them. For example, Beta has cashed out a massive $32 million in one transaction.

Also mentioned in the report, Chainalysis also found that ethereum scams are currently on the rise despite being much smaller in scale:

“In 2018, only 0.01% of ether was stolen in scams, worth $36 million, double the $17 million take for 2017.”

Notably, bad actors seem to be unaffected by the bear crypto markets.

The report stated that in 2018 when the price of bitcoin dropped by as much as 80%, “darknet market activity nearly doubled.”

The firm stated:

“Cryptocurrency crime is evolving to become part of traditional crime, and we think this trend will continue in 2019. Cryptocurrency market participants will need cutting edge technology and investigative analysis to fight back.”

Back in October last year, a similar report from Group-IB anther cybersecurity vendor claimed that North Korea’s infamous Lazarus hacking firm managed to steal an astounding $571 million in crypto assets from exchanges since January 2017.

Could these facts possibly lead to the eventual prosecution of these hacking groups? Only time will tell, for now, let us know your thoughts by leaving a comment below.

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