Los riesgos cada vez mayores de negligencia de la seguridad en las casas de cambio de criptomonedas: El debido diligencia inversor en la era post-HitBTC

The crypto industry's 2025 security landscape was defined by a stark reality: centralized exchanges remain prime targets for sophisticated cyberattacks, with financial losses reaching unprecedented levels. While the HitBTC incident itself remains shrouded in ambiguity, the broader context of 2025-marked by the $1.5 billion Bybit cold wallet breach and a total of $2.2 billion in global crypto theft-underscores a critical lesson for investors: platform security is no longer a peripheral concern but a foundational pillar of risk assessment.

A Year of Record-Breaking Breaches

According to a report by , 2025 saw approximately $2.2 billion stolen through crypto-related hacks, with centralized exchanges accounting for the lion's share of losses. The Bybit breach, attributed to North Korea's Lazarus Group, epitomized the scale and sophistication of modern threats. Attackers exploited front-end UI manipulation and multi-signature wallet deception to bypass cold storage protections, stealing 401,000 ETH-a haul valued at $1.5 billion. This incident, the largest single crypto hack in history, exposed systemic vulnerabilities in private key management and operational security.

The threat landscape shifted dramatically in 2025. As Chainalysis noted in its mid-year update, the number of hacks declined by half compared to 2024, but the average loss per incident more than doubled to $15 million. This trend reflects a strategic pivot by cybercriminals toward high-impact, low-frequency attacks. State-sponsored actors, particularly from North Korea, leveraged advanced techniques to target infrastructure with weak custody protocols, as seen in the Bybit and WLFI breaches.

Investor Due Diligence: Beyond Price Volatility

For investors, the 2025 crises highlight the need to reevaluate risk frameworks. Traditional metrics like market capitalization and trading volume are insufficient in a sector where platform security directly impacts asset safety. Here are three critical steps for due diligence:

Demand Transparency in Security Audits Platforms must publish regular third-party audits of their smart contracts and custody systems. The Bybit breach, for instance, revealed flaws in multi-signature wallet implementations-a vulnerability that could have been mitigated through rigorous external reviews according to . Investors should prioritize exchanges that disclose audit timelines and remediation processes.

Assess Custody Solutions Cold wallet compromises, as seen in the Bybit and HitBTC incidents, underscore the risks of hot wallet overreliance. According to , 22 exchange breaches in 2025 resulted in $1.8 billion in damages, with hot wallets being a recurring point of failure. Investors should favor platforms that allocate a majority of assets to offline storage and employ multi-layered encryption.

Evaluate AML/KYC Frameworks Regulatory scrutiny intensified in 2025 following the Bybit breach, with authorities demanding stricter anti-money laundering (AML) and know-your-customer (KYC) protocols. Platforms with robust compliance programs are less likely to attract illicit activity, reducing the risk of regulatory penalties or operational shutdowns.

Risk Mitigation in a Post-HitBTC Era

The October 2025 crypto crash, which saw $19 billion in liquidated positions, further illustrates the compounding risks of leverage and liquidity fragility. While security breaches directly impact asset safety, they can also exacerbate market instability by triggering panic selling and margin calls. Investors must diversify across platforms and asset classes to buffer against such cascading effects.

Moreover, the rise of real-time monitoring tools offers a defensive edge. Post-2025, exchanges are increasingly adopting AI-driven anomaly detection to flag suspicious transactions. Investors should inquire about a platform's use of such technologies, as they can significantly reduce the window of opportunity for attackers.

Conclusion

The 2025 security crises-from Bybit to the broader $2.7 billion in global theft-serve as a wake-up call for the crypto industry. For investors, the HitBTC incident (and its contemporaries) underscores the imperative of treating platform security as a non-negotiable criterion. In an era where state-sponsored actors and advanced phishing campaigns dominate the threat landscape, due diligence must evolve beyond price charts and trading volumes. The future of crypto investing hinges on a rigorous, evidence-based approach to platform risk assessment-one that prioritizes transparency, custody innovation, and regulatory alignment.