BitMart Hack – A missing pile of Safemoon and other cryptocurrencies, accusations of broken promises, and then nothing. When a high-profile cyber attack takes place and hundreds of millions of dollars are lost, usually a healthy balance is struck between safeguarding information to protect ongoing investigations and maintaining a level of transparent communication with the...

Coincheck hack – the biggest crypto heist in history at the time it occurred in 2018 was an eye-opener for many reasons, not least of which for the way the stolen assets were being stored.  Seasoned crypto enthusiasts and early adopters of the disruptive new technology know now that safely storing your digital assets is...

Wallet Attacks: A Deep-dive Wallets are a logical target for cyber-attacks, along with the emerging institutions that hold custody of them on users’ behalf. While secured with technically unbreakable code, hackers have found numerous ways to execute wallet attacks and gain illicit access to user wallets, whether by deception, theft, or ingenuity. In responding to...

Axie Infinity’s Ronin Bridge Hack for $551M worth of crypto assets could paradoxically lead to higher rates of blockchain adoption by showing that it’s a lot easier to track stolen cryptocurrency than people think. The popular misconception that cryptocurrencies are private and untraceable fuels the equally popular misconception that it’s impossible to track and recover...

Consensus Attacks: A Deep-dive Where centralized systems operate on the basis of centralized permission, blockchain protocols proceed on the basis of decentralized consensus. While this is more secure in theory, the system is not flawless. All blockchains are susceptible to consensus attacks, thanks to the ability to simulate, force, or circumvent majority consent for a...

Network Attacks: A Deep-dive Network attacks are a class of exploits that focus on the isolation and manipulation of individual nodes or groups of nodes. While blockchain networks are theoretically robust against such attempts, both hackers and academics have found loopholes that can be used not only to defraud and damage individuals, but also scale...

Smart Contract Risk and How to Mitigate It: A Deep-dive The strengths of smart contracts are also the source of its weaknesses, and will always present opportunities for hackers to exploit. So far, the pace of innovation in counter-measures is struggling to keep pace with innovation in the methods of attack. It’s reasonable to assume...

The full story behind the Wormhole bridge hack that led to the fraudulent minting of 120,000 wETH and threatened to crash Solana. Early February of 2022 was a low-point for the cryptocurrency asset class; one of many more to come throughout the year. The price of BTC was on a relentless downtrend from a high...

Security Threats to Blockchain Networks – The utopian view of the blockchain as an unhackable alternative to the status quo is a pipedream. Many traditional cyberattacks are effective in a blockchain-based setting, and even cryptographically-secured processes are prone to errors and exploits. Understanding the potential attack vectors is a prerequisite to building a stable blockchain-based...

Table of ContentsCyber-Attack Strategies in the Blockchain Era – A Framework for Categorizing the Emerging Threats to the Crypto EconomyMarket attacksPump-and-dumpExit scamRug-pullInvestment scamFront runningEconomic attacksPhishingSpear phishingExtortionRansomwareChurningCelebrity-based scamsConsensus attacksFinney attackRace attackVector7651% majority attackNothing-at-stakeWeak subjectivityLiveness denialCensorshipPrecomputation attackSelfish miningBribery attacksLong-range PoS attacksSimplePosterior CorruptionStake BleedingNetwork-level attacksRouting attacksSybil attacksDDoS (Distributed Denial of Service)Eclipse attacksTransaction MalleabilityTimejackingWallet attacksSeizure of Private Keys (Hot...