Cybercriminals stole $2.7 billion in crypto this year, a new record for crypto theft, according to blockchain monitoring firms.
Once again in 2025, there were dozens of cryptocurrency heists that hit many cryptocurrency exchanges and other web3 and decentralized finance (DeFi) projects. The biggest hack by far was the breach at Dubai-based crypto exchange Bybit, where hackers stole around $1.4 billion in crypto. Blockchain analytics firms, as well as the FBI, blamed North Korean government hackers — the most prolific group targeting cryptocurrencies in recent years — for this massive heist.
This was the largest known crypto heist of all time and one of the largest financial heists in human history. Before the Bybit hack, the biggest crypto thefts were $624 million and $611 million for hackers in the Ronin Network and Poly Network breaches in 2022, respectively.
Cryptocurrency trackers Chainalysis and TRM Labs both estimated a total of $2.7 billion stolen in crypto in 2025, per data shared with TechCrunch. Chainalysis also tracked another $700,000 stolen from individual crypto wallets, the company said.
De.Fi, the web3 security company that runs the REKT database which tracks crypto theft, also estimated $2.7 billion in stolen and hacked cryptocurrencies last year.
As usual, North Korean government hackers were the most successful cryptocurrency thieves in 2025, stealing at least $2 billion, according to Chainalysis and Elliptic, which estimates that Kim Jong Un’s hackers have stolen about $6 billion since 2017. North Korea uses crypto theft to finance its sanctioned nuclear program her.
Other major crypto breaches this year included this one against Cattlea decentralized exchange, which netted hackers $223 million. the violation against Balancera protocol based on the Ethereum blockchain, which resulted in a loss of $128 million. and that against crypto exchange Phemexwhere cybercriminals stole more than $73 million.
Cybercriminals targeting crypto exchanges and other DeFi projects aren’t slowing down. In 2024, hackers stole $2.2 billion in cryptowhile the previous year, in 2023, the total was $2 billion.
