$162M of Stolen Crypto Recovered in May Amid Surge in Hacking Activity

Hackers stole $257 million in digital assets during May, marking one of the most active months for crypto exploits this year. Nearly two-thirds of the pilfered funds—$162 million—were either frozen or recovered, offering potential restitution for affected investors.

The Cetus Protocol decentralized exchange suffered the largest breach, losing $230 million due to flawed smart contracts. A swift governance vote on the sui blockchain froze over $160 million, enabling clawback from hacker-controlled wallets. Cork Protocol and Taiwan’s BitoPro exchange followed with $12 million and $11.5 million losses respectively, the latter discovered through blockchain sleuth ZachXBT’s analysis.

Security firm SlowMist identified smart contract vulnerabilities as the root cause in 95% of cases, with oracle manipulations and unclear exploits accounting for smaller losses. The figures exceed PeckShield’s earlier estimate of $244 million in May exploits, underscoring growing security challenges as North Korean-linked actors increasingly target retail wallets.