$282 Million in Cryptocurrency Stolen in Social Engineering Attack: The Most Dangerous Hacker Method of 2025

Social engineering has become the most common hacking attack method in the crypto industry by 2025. A recent dramatic incident clearly demonstrates this threat: an attacker used social engineering techniques to steal cryptocurrencies worth $282 million from a hardware wallet user. The details behind the event reveal how vulnerable the sector truly is.

Attack Details: 2.05 Million Litecoin and Bitcoin Targeted

On January 10th at 23:00 UTC, during this attack, the victim lost a total of 2.05 million Litecoin (LTC) and 1,459 Bitcoin (BTC). Considering current prices, with LTC trading at around $59.69 and BTC at approximately $79,010, this loss represents a significant blow in the crypto world. The attacker’s target was not only valuable crypto assets; they also employed sophisticated methods to cover their tracks.

What Is Social Engineering? Increasing Threats in the Crypto World

Social engineering attacks target human psychology rather than technology. In such attacks, hackers impersonate a company employee or a representative of an organization to establish fake communication. After gradually gaining the victim’s trust, they persuade them to share private keys, login credentials, or other sensitive data. When it comes to crypto assets, these attacks can result in almost irreversible losses.

Monero Conversion and Obfuscation Strategy via Thorchain

Most of the funds seized by the attacker were quickly swapped into Monero (XMR). During this process, the price of XMR increased by approximately 70% over four days; the volume executed by the attacker was enough to significantly impact the market. Some of the Bitcoin was transferred across multiple blockchains via the Thorchain protocol to enhance privacy. These funds, bridged to networks like Ethereum, Ripple, and Litecoin, became much harder to trace.

Analysis by blockchain researcher ZachXBT indicated that the attacker is not connected to North Korea. This proved that such sophisticated transactions can be carried out by individual hackers or smaller hacker groups.

Connection to Ledger Data Leak: Rise of Social Engineering Attacks

This incident occurred just five days after the data leak at hardware wallet provider Ledger on January 5th. The breach exposed personal data such as user names and contact information to unauthorized parties. The success rate of social engineering attacks increases significantly when detailed information about victims is available. Attackers can use these data leaks to manipulate users and make social engineering attacks more convincing.

This scenario clearly shows that by 2025, social engineering has become one of the fundamental threats in the crypto sector. Technical security measures can be rendered ineffective if the human factor is ignored. It is an undeniable fact that users, institutions, and platform providers must be more vigilant against social engineering risks.