Only one sufferer misplaced $12.2 million in January by copying the incorrect deal with from their transaction historical past in an “deal with poisoning assault,” including to the same $50 million assault in December, in response to Rip-off Sniffer.
Handle poisoning is when attackers ship small transactions or “mud” from addresses that look much like ones within the goal’s transaction historical past, hoping the sufferer will copy the incorrect deal with.
Rip-off Sniffer added that signature phishing additionally surged lately, with $6.27 million stolen from 4,741 victims in January, a 207% enhance in comparison with December.
Two wallets accounted for 65% of all signature phishing losses.
Signature phishing is barely completely different because it tips customers into signing malicious blockchain transactions, akin to limitless token approvals.
Handle poisoning development not slowing down
“Handle poisoning is likely one of the most constant methods massive quantities of crypto get misplaced,” reported safety agency Web3 Antivirus on Thursday.
A few of the largest deal with poisoning losses it tracked over time ranged from $4 million to $126 million. “Latest incidents present this development isn’t slowing down,” they said.
Associated: Stablecoin ‘mud’ txs on Ethereum triple post-Fusaka: Coin Metrics
The researchers defined that deal with poisoners “generate full addresses that match the identical first/previous few characters you see, however the center is completely different, so it seems to be ‘similar.’”
Mud assaults on Ethereum have surged
Analysts speculate that the Ethereum Fusaka improve in December has contributed to the rise in assaults as a result of it made the community cheaper to make use of by way of transaction prices.
Stablecoin-related mud exercise is now estimated to make up 11% of all Ethereum transactions and 26% of lively addresses on a mean day, reported Coin Metrics earlier in February.
The agency analyzed over 227 million steadiness updates for stablecoin wallets on Ethereum from November 2025 by January 2026, discovering that 38% had been below a single penny — “according to thousands and thousands of wallets receiving tiny poisoning deposits,” it said.
Blockchain intelligence agency Whitestream reported on Sunday that the decentralized DAI stablecoin “has gained a popularity as a most popular stablecoin for illicit actors, serving as a ‘parking place’ for illegally sourced funds.”
“That is because of the protocol’s governance, which doesn’t cooperate with authorities in freezing DAI wallets,” it said, referencing latest deal with poisoning assaults.
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