The FBI on Wednesday accused North Korea of being behind the theft of US$1.5 billion of digital assets last week, the largest crypto heist in history.
Dubai, United Arab Emirates-based cryptocurrency exchange Bybit reported last week that it had been robbed of 400,000 in cryptocurrency ethereum.
The company said that attackers exploited security protocols during a transaction, enabling them to transfer the assets to an unidentified address.
Photo: AP
The US government has pointed the finger at Pyongyang.
“[North Korea] was responsible for the theft of approximately US$1.5 billion in virtual assets from cryptocurrency exchange, Bybit,” the FBI said in a public service announcement.
The bureau said a group called TraderTraitor, also known as the Lazarus Group, are behind the theft. It said they were “proceeding rapidly and have converted some of the stolen assets to bitcoin and other virtual assets dispersed across thousands of addresses on multiple blockchains.”
“It is expected these assets will be further laundered and eventually converted to fiat currency,” the FBI added.
Lazarus Group gained notoriety a decade ago when it was accused of hacking into Sony Pictures as revenge for The Interview, a film that mocked North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
It was also allegedly behind the 2022 US$620 million heist of ethereum and USD coin from the Ronin Network in 2022, previously the biggest crypto theft in history.
In December last year, the US and Japan blamed it for the theft of more than US$300 million of ryptocurrency from the Japan-based exchange DMM Bitcoin.
North Korea’s cyberwarfare program dates back to at least the mid-1990s, and the country has been dubbed “the world’s most prolific cyberthief” by a cybersecurity firm.
Pyongyang’s program has grown to a 6,000-strong cyberwarfare unit known as Bureau 121 that operates from several countries, a 2020 US military report said.
A UN panel on North Korea’s evasion of sanctions last year estimated the nation has stolen more than US$3 billion in cryptocurrency since 2017.
Much of the hacking activity is reportedly directed by Pyongyang’s Reconnaissance General Bureau, its primary foreign intelligence agency.
Money stolen helps to fund the country’s nuclear weapons program, the panel said.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
RSS