Kaspersky Lab: Loss from ICO cyberattacks exceeds $300 mln in 2017

MOSCOW, Dec 6 (PRIME) -- Perpetrators stole more than U.S. $300 million in 2017 through attacking initial coin offerings (ICO), Alexander Gostev, chief antivirus expert at Russian antivirus software maker Kaspersky Lab, said on Wednesday at a news conference.

On the global scale, companies raised some $3.5 billion via ICOs in 2017. “Of the total, $300 million were stolen one way or another,” Gostev said, adding that the number of victims exceeded 60,000 people.

Thieves used various methods, including about 2,000 phishing attacks.

“Kaspersky Lab’s experts saw classic phishing scams to trick potential investors and frankly fake projects to collect money without implementing any ideas,” the expert said.

For example, an ICO Web site of an unnamed Israeli startup was hacked with the address being replaced, bringing perpetrators $7 million within several hours before the fraud was discovered.

In 2018, attacks on cryptocurrencies will continue and fraud will evolve. “The most interesting thing is that we’ll see development of this industry. In addition to traditional attacks on cryptocurrencies, virtual values will be targeted in blockchain (apps, platforms, games working on this technology),” Gostev said.

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