According to a blog post published by ChainAnalysis approximately 10% of all Ethereum holdings generated by ICOs are now stolen or have changed owner without permission (which is gentler way of saying it).
The first one was the DAO, in 2016, which drained $74 millions out of the $150 millions subscribed and led to the creation of ETC. Since then, more than $1.6 billions (yes, billions) were raised through various ICOs, but out of this amount, again, hackers got another $150 millions.
These numbers are mind boggling and the whole situation calls for a much more balanced approach towards investing in cryptos. The gains in privacy generated by the raise of cryptocurrencies can be a double edged sword, as not only your identity is protected, but also the identity of a potential thief. It's true that in cryptos (at least for now) the potential revenue is stellar, but if you're not taking basic security measures, the gains can be wiped out in seconds.
There are a few measures that one can take to minimize the risks, and here's an excerpt from the above article:
Beware of inbound messages from services, try to always bookmark the services that you regularly visit and do not click on advertised google results
Beware of direct messages in Social medias and Slack forums as companies in general communicate messages in public
Messages from slackbots should be treated carefully as these messages can be easily triggered by an adversary
Do a background check e.g. use the list of Ethereum scams in the Ethereum Scam Database
I highly recommend a thorough lecture of the entire article, if you're serious about investing in cryptos.
10% of stolen funds is a frightening percentage.
image source - Pixabay
I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.
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I am frighted and outraged by the stats.. still, why do we care ?
amigo #resteemia at your service
'approximately 10% of all Ethereum holdings generated by ICOs are now stolen or have changed owner without permission'
it's a serious trouble. so i'm happy to see such kind of regulations on ICOs. nice work @dragosroua
ReSteemia
'UpVote ReSteem Comment'
@dragosroua,
Wow that's an interesting news :O A huge amount of fund base was stolen! OMG those are millions and billions!
Anyway the link you provided at the end of the article is not working properly!
Thank you very much for your great effort and sharing knowledge with us!
Cheers~
I am running Solar coach ICO on Bitshares, I hope it is safer !
Spelling Mistake Gone Wrong:
I use shapeshift.io for converting any crypto currency to another one. Once while I was using to convert Ethereum to DigiByte, I was stolen of all the ETH I had sent them. After several emails to the support team, it turned out that I had used the wrong website. I had used s-h-a-p-e-h-i-f-t instead of s-h-a-p-e-s-h-i-f-t. As of today, the scam website has been taken down. I had only lost about $2 worth of ETH, but it had meant a lot back then. Just be careful even when entering urls directly onto your browser. Even on steemit, be careful when sending sbd/steem to other accounts. Some common spelling mistakes people make are @randomwhale (it has a 'm') and @bitrex (single 't')
@dragosroua - The given advices are very useful not to be a part of those phishing sites Sir. Very useful information you shared with us Sir. And the new UI of steem.supply is excellent Sir. Therefore, I wish to ReSteem your post.
+W+ [UpVoted & ReSteemed]
sad to know that.
We really need some solid balance between security (privacy) and anonymity for the future of the blockchain.
Even 2% or 3% would have been quite scary and worrying. But 10% is truly terrifying. One in ten is mindbogglingly high.
hackers always look for that :(