Every fortune comes with a little bit of risk, so does cryptocurrency. You might have heard of at least one story of cybercrime where people have lost their cryptocurrency.
Cryptocurrencies are typically the high-priority target of cybercriminals or fraudsters. In case, cybercriminals have access to your currency, they can directly target your wallet or hack the exchanges. In these uncertain situations, the person needs to take measures as soon as possible.
This article gives you insights on how to recover your lost, hacked, or stolen cryptocurrency. However, first, let’s understand all about cryptocurrency.
Cryptocurrency
Cryptocurrency, a digital currency that exists electronically, has risen in popularity. The industry is witnessing the steady rise of users staking crypto to earn fixed interest or yield farming rewards.
Staking is when someone blocks or holds their money in the cryptocurrency wallet to maintain operations for a proof-of-stake (PoS)-based blockchain system.
This activity helps networks reach consensus while rewarding users who participate with Bitcoin and Ether being some well-known cryptocurrencies.
Here are a few ways to recover your lost, hacked or stolen cryptocurrency:
Report to police: The first instinct of a person against any scam, or theft is to reach out to the police. This is what you need to do in case of online crime as well.
Crypto frauds must be reported to the police. Collect every valuable information related to the scam or theft and report it to the police so that they can immediately respond with all the evidence or proof and arrest the scammer.
Inform the cryptocurrency exchange: Once you discover that your cryptocurrency has been stolen through hacking of your account, you should take action as soon as possible.
However, if your delay the tracing process, the hackers can get enough time to transfer the coins to a cold wallet and thereafter send them to other exchanges to hide their trail. This can make the recovery possible a next to the impossible mission.
Contact your bank: If your transaction history shows some bank-related costs such as transaction fees, then you should immediately contact your bank.
If you report the scammer to your bank, then they will take immediate action by starting the process of securing the defrauded account.
This helps in preventing the scammer from causing more damage to your finances.
Follow the money: Blockchain has a feature where transactions show the money trail through which you can easily track the hacker’s wallet address. You can check the wallet address and see where all the assets are transferred to or monitor its transactions.
In case, the scammer transfers the coins from the wallet to a cryptocurrency exchange, the report immediately to the crypto exchange.
When cryptocurrencies are transferred from a wallet to an exchange, they are usually changed into fiat currency.
Hire a recovery expert: If you feel helpless and unable to recover your cryptocurrency on your own.
You can hire a cryptocurrency recovery expert who will investigate and help you recover your funds.
However, these experts charge a hefty amount and often provide only public information that might not help in recovering your assets.
