The hackers made the most out of the bear market, with billions stolen from the crypto protocols. According to DefiLlama, hackers grossed over $3 billion this year. Lastly, they exploited over $718 million from DeFi protocol in October, making it the biggest month in the biggest year of crypto hacking activities.
But every story has its hero. The white-hat hackers have made significant contributions this year to protect users’ funds.
White-Hat vs. Black-Hat Hackers
Black-Hat hackers are cybercriminals that might exploit the vulnerabilities of smart contracts and steal users’ funds. They use various techniques like phishing attacks to access users’ funds.
Additionally, a technique that has recently gained headlines is the Crypto Drainers contract. They are smart contracts that scammers use to steal digital assets using phishing pages that impersonate the websites of popular projects. They trick victims into connecting their wallets to the website for minting and then steal their digital assets.
White hat hackers are ethical hackers who identify vulnerabilities for security purposes and help the team to fix them. They have permission from the team to hack into the protocol and get paid bounties if they successfully find vulnerabilities.
The Crypto Heroes Saved Over $20 Billion Users’ Funds
The Web3 ecosystem has billions of dollars parked in the DeFi ecosystem. The black-hat hackers are eager to exploit the vulnerabilities in the contract and drain those funds. The white-hat hackers have turned out to be the heroes of the ecosystem, saving over $20 billion in users’ funds.
With the growth of the ecosystem, there will be a necessity for ethical hackers to look for vulnerabilities in contracts and protect the users’ funds. For aspiring developers, this can be a lucrative career option to find bugs in smart contracts and win millions in bug bounty programs. The bug bounty market is expected to reach $5.5bn valuations by 2027.
