Crypto losses fell about 47% year-over-year to $1.32 billion in the first half of 2026. That sounds like good news, right? CertiK says not so fast.
The drop is mostly a statistical fluke. Last year’s numbers were skewed by the $1.4 billion Bybit hack — the biggest crypto theft ever. Take that out and the picture looks worse. Q2 alone saw $807.5 million in losses, up 59% from Q1. North Korean hackers were behind the two biggest hits: KelpDAO and Drift Protocol.
TRM Labs backs this up. Their H1 report found the number of incidents more than doubled, from 83 to 207. Smart contract exploits made up 60% of those. “The decline in total dollars stolen should not be mistaken for a safer environment,” TRM said. Straightforward.
Phishing drove most Q1 losses — $508.2 million. Wallet compromises took over in Q2. The attackers are getting more targeted and each event does more damage. CertiK warns the industry is “absorbing a structurally higher rate of attack activity.”
North Korean state hackers remain the biggest threat. They’ve stolen over $6 billion since 2017. In late June, US, Japanese, and South Korean officials met specifically to talk about stopping North Korea’s crypto cyber operations. The concern now includes North Korean IT workers using AI to scale up their schemes.
What should you do? CertiK says harden private key management. Hardware security, multisig governance, geographically spreading signers — every layer matters. This is where attackers focus, so this is where defenses need to be strongest.
The headline number fell. The risk didn’t.
