Cryptocurrency hacked? And the bitcoins go down!

(To Alessandro Rugolo)
03/01/18

One of the business of the moment seems to be the investment in cryptocurrency. The best known are Bitcoin, Ripple, Ethereum, Litecoin and other 700 types of digital currency, among them there is also a Youbit call, owned by Yapian, a South Korean company.

In the last year it seems that the South Koreans have discovered themselves passionate about cryptocurrency, but at the same time they have discovered how insecure it is to invest in something as ephemeral as Youbit. In fact, the Yapian company was the target of two hacker attacks in the same year, which led to bankruptcy.
And here again it turns out that the villain is that rogue state of North Korea ... Once again because it seems that North Korea has the most fierce hackers on the market, at least to hear the statements of American analysts. The news is immediately taken up with emphasis by everyone.

But what do the evidence tell us?

In the face of the bombastic declarations of the main newspapers, there is no need for evidence. Yet it would be enough to look at what is happening to have, at least, a minimum of reasonable doubt ... So let us take a look at what happens in the world around cryptocurrency, the possibilities of theft and the value on the market.

I believe that even the most distracted man in the street has hardly escaped the fact that the Bitcoin, the best known among several hundred digital coins, has in the last period had a huge increase in value creating, perhaps unwittingly, a number of new rich even among Sunday investors.
Could it ever be?
No. And in fact in the last period, if it is true that the Bitcoin has reached exorbitant figures exceeding the 18.000 $ of equivalent, it is also true that the cryptovaluta thefts have increased.

But let's see the facts:
- the December 20 last last hackers (North Koreans?) hit the Yapian company;

- the December 21 the US accused North Korea of ​​the hacker attack, at least so it supports the "the Wall Street Journal".

A few days before, the December 6 for accuracy, a Bitcoin theft was perpetrated against NiceHash, an electronic market for the issue and sale of cryptocurrency based in Slovenia, which claimed to have suffered a hacker attack with which 4.700 bitcoins were stolen from its customers for a value of about 62 million (on The Independent there is talk of about 64 billion dollars but going to the source we understand that this is an error).

In November, on the night of the 20, another theft against Tether, a market of cryptocurrency based in Hong Kong and the United States. This time the theft amounts to about 30 million dollars in turnover.

Also in the month of November it emerged that some bugs in the cryptowallet (wallets for cryptocurrency) issued by Parity (a London-based company that deals with the exchange of Ethereum) have caused the "freezing" of approximately 280 million dollars.

If we continue in the analysis backwards we will notice a worrying increasing number of attacks against the cryptocurrency and everything that revolves around you and the thing appears to be normal given the enormous development of the sector.

So what should we do for the future? You can invest with reasonable certainty in cryptocurrency? This is the question that everyone starts to ask themselves.
The right answer probably doesn't exist. As for me, I believe that the attacks will continue to exist and will be more and more frequent and it is not certain that they are the work of the "bad" hackers of North Korea. Perhaps, the ones that emerge are just part of the financial war that is being fought between the real world and cryptocurrency (is between cryptocurrency e cryptocurrency!) a war in which, as usual, there will be collateral damage which can not be foreseen today.

To learn more:
- http://www.businessinsider.com/cyberattack-brings-a-cryptocurrency-excha...
- http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/bitcoin-latest-updates-n...
- https://www.wsj.com/articles/cryptocurrency-exchange-collapses-files-for...
- https://seenews.com/news/slovenian-crypto-mining-firm-nicehash-reports-e...
- https://www.nicehash.com/about
- http://www.lastampa.it/2017/11/21/economia/nuovo-attacco-hacker-sul-bitc...
- https://tether.to;
- https://paritytech.io/blog/security-alert.html