Paxful, increased security against hacks
By Eleonora Spagnolo - 21 Oct 2020
Paxful has been hit by thousands of hack attempts, but most have been repelled. This is reported by the same bitcoin peer-to-peer exchange.
More specifically, many hacker attacks were phishing attacks, of which only 2% were successful and 98% were banned. In fact, 70% were stopped immediately, the remaining 30% took 1 to 4 days to be stopped.
In addition, tens of thousands of attacks were made trying to get users' entry credentials. However, in this case, only 0.1% of attempts were successful. Paxful's security systems made it possible to save at least 11 BTC.
All this was possible thanks to a security system implemented over time. At the helm is Dmitry Moiseev, Chief Information Security Officer. Whereas Lana Schwartzman, Chief Compliance Officer is responsible for dealing with the reporting system.
Paxful's security strategy for the platform
Paxful has appointed a security team to fend off hacker attacks, protecting users and funds. In addition, it is experimenting with internal tools and projects to develop a unique security system. This has allowed them to raise the security level of the platform by lowering the number of hacks compared to previous years.
Specifically, the company uses a solution proposed by the Group-IB company, which in just two months has rejected as many as 220,000 webbot requests. This has resulted in Paxful protecting as many as 5 million users.
On top of this, there are two tools employed thanks to the partnership with Chainalysis, which monitors transactions: the Chainalysis KYT and the Chainalysis Reactor, used to help identify suspicious transactions.
Finally, Paxful is one of the few P2P exchanges to have also implemented an AML (anti-money laundering) system.
But to avoid getting involved in scams, it is also essential to educate consumers, which is why Paxful has also made agreements with CoinEd and Blockchain Academy to implement responsible trading education activities.
Paxful, security and hacker attacks
It was something absolutely necessary, although, as Paxful (based in South Africa) points out, out of the $16 billion in cryptocurrency transactions in Africa, only 2% are for illegal purposes. Nevertheless, the exchange has opted for greater security.
Co-founder and CEO of Paxful Ray Youssef explained:
"In our experience, the majority of cryptocurrency transactions are safe. Despite this, risk management is top-of-mind for us to protect our customers and we have a dedicated team that focuses on risk assessment and security to keep our platform safe".
At Paxful, everyone must do their part to avoid 'incidents':
"The crypto-sector has come a long way to protect consumers, while continuously developing processes to advance adoption. What has played an integral role in the emergence of the crypto-economy is the human layer, the peer-to-peer finance powered by people. In essence, that means that we all have a role to play in making and keeping the economy safe as responsible participants".
And he concludes:
"Like with any other type of investment, there are certain risks involved and as crypto-market players, we have a responsibility to work with users to increase awareness about all the risks that come with trading crypto".
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Eleonora Spagnolo
Journalist passionate about the web and the digital world. She graduated with honours in Multimedia Publishing at the University La Sapienza in Rome and completed a master's degree in Web and Social Media Marketing.