Cryptocurrency losses exceeded $1 billion in the first half of 2026 as the industry saw the highest number of hacks in six months, according to onchain security platform Blockaid.

Ethereum and Solana recorded the largest losses from incidents affecting their networks, with approximately $332 million and $326 million in stolen funds, respectively, Blockaid said in its H1 2026 security report released Tuesday.

During this period, Blockaid tracked 212 security incidents, with the largest single exploit coming from KelpDAO worth $292 million, while the platform verified 3.4 times more high-threshold exploits in the first half of 2026 than in all of 2025.

The report found that code exploits were the cause of incidents on Ethereum, while breaches of keys and signing infrastructure caused most of the losses at Solana.

Ethereum’s losses reflected the risks associated with high-value protocols

Ethereum suffered the most losses from incidents in the first half of 2026, with attackers mainly targeting vulnerabilities in applications built on the network.

Blockaid stated that the code exploits Ethereum’s incident-dominated volume, and the main losses are also related to key compromises involving the Humanity Protocol and StablR. CoWSwap, an Ethereum-based decentralized exchange, was the only major Ethereum incident in the report classified as user error.

Blockchain losses according to the network in the first half of 2026. Source: Blockaid.

Blockaid has identified several common attack methods targeting Ethereum, including bridge and astute contract flaws, unauthorized access to privileged accounts, and market manipulation techniques.

The report points out that Ethereum remains a top target because it powers many of the crypto industry’s most valuable applications, including retaking platforms, stablecoins, and decentralized exchanges.

Solana’s losses increased as the attackers changed focus

Solana suffered almost the same losses as Ethereum in the first half of 2026, a acute raise from the approximately $127 million in stolen funds the network recorded in 2025.

“In 2025, losses of $2.58 billion from 63 incidents, including $1.5 billion in the first quarter Bybit, with Ethereum and Arbitrum being the largest networks in terms of flow of stolen funds,” Blockaid CEO Ido Ben-Natan told Cointelegraph.

Blockchain losses by network in 2025. Source: Blockaid.

The change was not due to an raise in astute contract exploits. Instead, the compromised keys accounted for more than 98% of Solana’s losses, mainly caused by incidents involving Drift Protocol and Step Finance, which Blockaid linked to North Korea-linked cyber groups.

Unlike Ethereum, where attackers mainly exploited vulnerabilities in the protocol code, the Solana incidents targeted signer infrastructure and organizational security, with several code exploits involving Raydium and Volo responsible for the remaining losses.

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