Chainalysis Opens 24-hour Hotline to Support Crypto Crime Victims

As crypto crime cases are on the rise, the blockchain intelligence company Chainalysis launches an always-on hotline to help crypto firms that have been targeted by scammers and hackers.

According to the official blog post, ransomware attackers have stolen $731 million in 2021, while 2020 has seen similar scammer activity, with $728 million being lost to attacks. Previous years have been a lot quieter, with $144 million total value of recorded ransomware attacks in 2019 and just $40 million in 2018.

The most notorious case of theft by hacking is the $622 million drain from Axie Infinity’s Ronin Ethereum Sidechain in March 2022. This hack alone accounts for one-third of the looted crypto this year, but there were other big cases, for instance the Bored Apes Yacht Club Discord server was hacked at the beginning of this month, setting the crypto community aback by $360,000 in stolen NFTs.

Chainalysis agrees that a prevention program is needed to educate the members of the crypto community about various methods of crypto-related online scamming, such as phishing through fake minting websites and gaining access to validators on blockchain to pass through illicit transactions.

Chainalysis Paints a Bright Picture for Crypto

Despite launching a 24-hour telephone line for the victims, Chainalysis assures that “crime represents a smaller and smaller share of all cryptocurrency activity.” However, those crypto-related cybercrimes that happen usually leave the victim without a chance to retrieve their funds.

That’s where Chainalysis Crypto Incident Response steps in: the rescue team will help to “prepare for the unpredictable,” and go through the long and nerve-wracking process of going to court to get the lost funds back. The Chainalysis team points out that theft via hacking and ransomware reflects badly on the general public’s trust in the cryptocurrency and blockchain technology sector, as well as presents “national security concerns.”