January saw the largest attack against a DeFi protocol of the quarter, the $40 million private key compromise of portfolio management platform Step Finance.
Crypto hackers stole over $168.6 million in cryptocurrency from 34 decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols in the first quarter of 2026, falling significantly from the same period last year, according to data from DefiLlama.
The $40 million private key compromise of Step Finance in January was the largest exploit of the quarter, the data shows, followed by a smart contract manipulation that drained $26.4 million in ether (ETH) from Truebit on Jan. 8. The third-largest was a private key compromise targeting stablecoin issuer Resolv Labs on March 21.
The quarterly figure is low given that the industry saw $1.58 billion stolen in the first quarter of 2025, with the bulk coming from the $1.4 billion Bybit exploit. However, experts warn that crypto hacks aren’t tied to specific periods within a year.
