$ETH Over 913,000 ETH — valued at around $3.4 billion — have been permanently lost due to human errors, according to Coinbase executive Conor Grogan. When combined with Ethereum’s EIP-1559 upgrade (introduced in 2021, which burns 50% of transaction fees), more than 5% of all ETH is gone forever.

These losses highlight how unforgiving crypto can be, where one mistake may be irreversible. Common causes include:

Lost private keys or seed phrases → once forgotten, access to the wallet is gone forever.

Sending ETH to the wrong or invalid address → funds are stuck permanently.

Interacting with faulty or restrictive smart contracts → ETH can end up locked without any way to withdraw.

The funds still technically exist on the blockchain, but no one will ever be able to use them again — underscoring the critical importance of security and caution in crypto.