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It once was known only to computer nerds or people who are looking for a quick buck, or someone with a shady business. Today, Cryptocurrency has now evolved into a popular method of payment.
Kaspersky Lab recently noted that 10% of the world’s population now use Cryptocurrency to pay for their purchases. Unfortunately, cybercriminals are also taking advantage of this recent rise in its usage by attacking Cryptocurrency exchanges and investors.
This is putting people at high risk of being robbed of their investments stashed in this free for all technology, because it’s a hacker’s job to engineer new tactics in order to exploit the security of this relatively new technology.
A lot of establishments now started giving their customers an option to pay by Cryptocurrency, by the use of kiosks and computer systems that can processes such transactions.
This caused prices to go down. Even big sports teams are doing collaboration with Cryptocurrency exchanges. Still, along with people showing their interest in, and being willing to invest and use Cryptocurrency, they as well put their money at risk of being stolen, due to weakening security measures of Cryptocurrency wallets and exchanges being under constant attack with hackers.
Safety nets for crypto a must
Major incidents, like that in 2005, when 120,000 Bitcoins were stolen from different wallets on Bitfinex, and when Coincheck lost 530 Million USD in 2018, just exposes the vulnerabilities of these exchanges and how easy it is for Cybercriminals to access the networks and cause massive, irrevocable destruction.
It’s particularly scary to think that when a Cryptocurrency exchange is hacked, and all its money stolen, none would ever be returned to the stakeholders.
New companies and startups that are setting up their own Initial Coin Offering (ICO) is in significantly more risk, because based on statistics, people who set them up doesn’t have experience with Cybersecurity. When an unfortunate attack is to happen, this lack of experience would leave them helpless as they watch the hackers take down all their hard work.
The biggest problem so far is that the Cryptocurrency network is still not yet being regulated and there aren’t any standard security assessment procedures being implemented.
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(Jet Encila is a journalist, editor and freelance writer from the Philippines).