In the past, the words “cryptocurrency” and “blockchain” were synonymous with crime. Things are different now, because now we know that this young industry offers more than shady business. However, criminals clearly still have a place in the cryptocurrency space. Research by Solidus Labs shows this.
Smart Contract Scams
As of October 10, 2022, the blockchain analyst found as many as 188,525 scams on 12 different smart contract blockchains. Not all of the investigated networks are mentioned, but in any case Ethereum (ETH), Polygon (MATIC) and the BNB chain (BNB) are involved.
Especially when you consider that it’s only about the blockchain that makes smart contracts possible, that’s a sizable amount. In fact, these chains have an average of 15 scams per hour. 12% of all minted tokens are fraudulent on the BNB chain and 8% on Ethereum.
Solidus estimates the lower bound on the total value of the fraudulent contracts at $910 million. This amount only includes funds that ended up being scammed through regulated and/or centralized exchanges such as Binance. The actual amount may be much higher.
According to the company, these fake smart contracts are designed to steal your funds. They can be automatically deployed and easily repeated. They often go hand-in-hand with pullbacks, a term from the cryptocurrency community that is actually synonymous with Ponzi schemes.
Cryptocurrency cracks the order of the day
Aside from these types of scams, hacking is still the norm. At the beginning of October, there have never been more hacks in a month, and then the month has only just begun. So-called “bridges” are a welcome target in this regard. By 2022, more than 2 billion of these connections between different protocols have been lost. In fact, despite the price crash, 2022 will be a record year for hacking in general.
Source of information: Compiled from CRYPTO-INSIDERS by 0x information.The copyright belongs to the author Simon Bosch and may not be reproduced without permission