Solana Foundation Warns of AI-Powered Scams Surpassing Smart Contract Bugs

The cryptocurrency industry's biggest security threat is shifting from technical vulnerabilities in smart contracts to social engineering attacks, according to Michael Coates, Chief Information Security Officer at the Solana Foundation.

Citing recent incidents, Coates said that a significant number of major security breaches originated not from smart contract vulnerabilities but from more sophisticated breaches involving fake identities and AI-driven scams.

He emphasized that while cryptocurrency hacks garner attention for large-scale fund theft, they often stem from operational security failures or vulnerabilities in the Web2 domain rather than flaws in the blockchain itself.

Coates warned that advances in AI and deepfakes will make social engineering attacks far more severe, making it impossible for users to perfectly distinguish every scam.