Crypto hacks hit record high in H1 2026, losses top $1 billion
Security & Exploits ·
Blockaid tallied 212 security incidents in the first half of 2026, the most ever recorded in a six-month period, with combined losses surpassing $1 billion.
Ethereum-related projects lost approximately $332 million over the period, while Solana-related projects lost about $326 million, according to the on-chain security platform, as reported by wublockchain.xyz. The single largest incident was the $292 million exploit of KelpDAO, which alone accounted for nearly a third of Ethereum-side losses.
The two chains suffered losses through different mechanisms. Ethereum losses were mainly attributed to code vulnerabilities in smart contracts, the kind of bugs that let attackers drain funds directly from flawed protocol logic. Solana losses followed a different pattern: more than 98% of the chain's losses stemmed from compromised keys and signing infrastructure rather than contract-level flaws, with Drift Protocol and Step Finance cited as the primary cases affected.
Blockaid linked the incidents to hacking groups associated with North Korea, pointing to a pattern of infrastructure-level compromise rather than isolated smart-contract exploits. That distinction matters because it suggests Solana's exposure in this period ran through operational security — how keys and signing processes are managed — rather than through auditable code, a harder vector to patch with contract reviews alone.
The record incident count of 212 was corroborated by a second account of the same Blockaid data, which likewise put combined losses above $1 billion and identified Ethereum and Solana as the two chains with the largest exposure, at $332 million and $326 million respectively, a account also covered by theblock.co.
Not yet detailed is how losses break down across the remaining chains and incidents beyond Ethereum, Solana, and the KelpDAO case, nor whether the North Korea-linked groups tied to the Solana signing compromises have been further identified. Whether the H1 2026 total marks a peak or the start of a longer upward trend in incident frequency remains to be seen in subsequent reporting periods.