In the first six months of 2023, the South Korean bitcoin exchange Upbit faced 159,061 hacking attempts. Yonhap reports.
The company that owns and operates the platform, Dunamu, disclosed these figures to Congressman Pak Seong-joon of the National Assembly’s Committee on Science, Technology, Information, Broadcasting and Communications.
The figure was up 2.17 times year over year.
A Dunamu representative noted that after the 2019 breach, the exchange implemented a series of measures to bolster security. The loss from the incident amounted to ₩58 billion ($42.84 million at the time of writing).
Upbit stores up to 70% of funds in cold wallets and uses hot addresses across several structures, having improved their governance.
Since 2019, the platform has not recorded a single successful cybersecurity breach.
Congressman Pak Seong-joon noted the global rise in attacks on crypto exchanges. He emphasised the need for government assistance in strengthening countermeasures against hacker activity.
“The Ministry of Science and Technology must carry out large-scale testing and examine the information-security conditions in preparation for cyberattacks on virtual asset exchanges, where hacking attempts are frequent,” said the congressman.
| Number of cyberattack attempts against Upbit by period | |
| Second half of 2020 | 8356 |
| First half of 2021 | 34 687 |
| Second half of 2021 | 63 912 |
| First half of 2022 | 73 249 |
| Second half of 2022 | 87 242 |
| First half of 2023 | 159 061 |
September was a record month in 2023 for losses in the crypto industry from hacks and frauds ($329.8 million), according to CertiK. One of the largest incidents was the successful attack on the exchange CoinEx ($53 million).