Hacken: audit gaps exposed as Q3 hacks cost $1.18 billion

Blockchain security firm Hacken found hackers stole $1.18 billion across 107 incidents in the third quarter, 55% more than the prior quarter. Roughly $906.8 million of the losses stemmed from compromised suppliers or developer tools, publicly available fixes that were never installed, or components excluded from the latest security review.

• Hacken warns that audit badges give investors a false sense of security: reviews often cover only specific smart contracts, leaving wallets, signing systems and third-party software outside the tested scope.
• The largest incident in the period was September's Bitget attack (at least $352 million), alongside the Ledger CryptoBilis spy-chip breach (~$93 million) and multiple bridge exploits.
• Hacken also flagged key-management setups at two unnamed derivatives venues where over $700 million in assets relied on signing arrangements it called inadequate given the sums involved, though it found no live vulnerability.