Coldcard Hack Losses Unclear While Investigators Trace Stolen Bitcoin

TL;DR

• The Coldcard hack has no definitive loss figure: CryptoQuant confirms 1,432 BTC stolen, while Galaxy and TRM Labs estimate up to 1,816 BTC.
• Galaxy Research directly confirmed more than 450 BTC through victim reports, though it suspects higher amounts that cannot yet be corroborated with sufficient evidence.
• TRM Labs estimates that attackers drained around 5,200 addresses in four waves, and expects the figure to keep rising before stabilizing.

The hack of Coldcard is testing the limits of blockchain investigation methodologies for quantifying losses in attacks on self-custody wallets. Unlike what happens when a centralized exchange is breached, no complete record of affected accounts exists, which forces researchers to build estimates rather than determine a definitive figure.

The blockchain analytics platform CryptoQuant places Coldcard losses at 1,432 BTC. Its methodology is based on public reports from victims who provide wallet addresses or transaction IDs, and cross-references that information with known onchain patterns from the attack.

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