Hacks drained $1.26B from crypto even as bitcoin price surged

While bitcoin's price had a strong quarter, hackers and exploiters stole an estimated $1.26 billion from various crypto projects, wallets, and platforms during the same period. These are two separate stories happening at once: price going up doesn't mean the industry got safer.

If your coins sit on an exchange or in a smart contract (a self-executing piece of code that holds or moves funds) that gets hacked, price gains elsewhere won't protect your actual holdings.

This is a good reminder to keep funds you're not actively trading in a cold wallet (a device or storage not connected to the internet) rather than leaving everything on an exchange or app. No immediate action needed unless you hold assets on a platform specifically named in a hack report.