Key Highlights
- Crypto losses surged to $163M in August 2025, a 15% increase from July, with major hacks targeting BtcTurk and a Bitcoin holder.
- A single Bitcoin holder lost $91.4 million in a social engineering scam on August 19, 2025.
- BtcTurk, Turkey’s largest crypto exchange, suffered a $54 million breach, its second major hack in 14 months.
The cryptocurrency sector faced a sharp rise in security breaches in August 2025, with hackers stealing $163 million across 16 major incidents, according to blockchain security firm PeckShield. This marks a 15% increase from July’s $142 million in losses, underscoring the growing sophistication of cybercriminal tactics targeting exchanges, decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols, and individual investors.
Bitcoin Holder Loses $91.4 Million in Social Engineering Attack
On August 19, 2025, a single Bitcoin holder lost 783 BTC, valued at $91.4 million, in a social engineering scam. Attackers, posing as customer support staff for a hardware wallet, tricked the victim into revealing wallet credentials. The stolen funds were swiftly laundered through Wasabi Wallet, a privacy-focused tool that obscures transaction trails, making recovery unlikely. Blockchain analyst ZachXBT later confirmed the incident, noting the attackers built trust over time before executing the theft. This breach alone accounted for over half of August’s total losses, highlighting the vulnerability of high-value individual wallets to targeted scams.
Other significant incidents included a $7 million hack of ODIN•FUN, a token launchpad, and a $5 million exploit of BetterBank.io, a PulseChain-based lending protocol. BetterBank’s breach stemmed from manipulated liquidity pools and reward minting systems, despite prior warnings from auditor Zokyo. CrediX Finance, operating on the Sonic blockchain, lost $4.5 million in an exploit on August 4, which later escalated into an exit scam when the development team vanished after transferring assets through Tornado Cash.
BtcTurk Exchange Hit with $54 Million Breach
Turkey’s leading crypto exchange, BtcTurk, reported a $54 million theft from its hot wallets on August 14, 2025. The attack, detected by cybersecurity firm Cyvers, involved coordinated asset transfers across multiple blockchain networks, including Ethereum, Avalanche, and Polygon. BtcTurk suspended deposits and withdrawals, citing a “technical issue,” but confirmed losses of $48 million to $54 million. This marks the exchange’s second major breach in 14 months, following a $54 million hack in June 2024, bringing its cumulative losses above $100 million. The repeated targeting of BtcTurk raises concerns about centralized exchange security, particularly around hot wallet key management.
PeckShield’s data indicates that the five largest incidents accounted for 99% of August’s losses, with hackers exploiting weak audits, untested systems, and human errors. Reports also suggest North Korean hackers, responsible for $1.6 billion in crypto thefts in the first half of 2025, continue to drive global losses. The sector’s rapid growth, coupled with rising crypto prices (‘Bitcoin traded above $100,000 in August’) has intensified attacker focus on high-value targets, necessitating stronger custody solutions and security audits.
