North Korea orchestrated at least seven cyberattacks on cryptocurrency platforms last year and emptied accounts worth nearly $ 400 million, according to a cybersecurity company.
2021 was one of the most lucrative years for North Korea's digital army, the Chainalysis report concludes.
"From 2020 to 2021, the number of cyber-attacks linked to North Korea increased from four to seven, while the assets removed in those attacks increased by 40%," the company said.
"Once these funds came into the possession of North Korea, a careful money laundering process began to cover the case and redeem the amounts."
This is not the first time the Pyongyang government has been accused of plagiarism. A UN panel of experts monitoring the implementation of sanctions against North Korea has accused the country of using stolen funds to fund its nuclear and ballistic missile programs, thus circumventing sanctions.
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Last year, the United States prosecuted three North Korean intelligence operatives accused of plotting a multi-year hacking campaign that targeted companies, banks and Hollywood studios and embezzled $ 1,3 billion in cash and cash.
Chainalysis did not name all the targets of last year's attacks, but said it was mainly private equity firms and digital exchanges such as Liquid.com, which admitted last August that strangers had breached digital wallets managed by the company.
The attackers used malicious code as well as advanced social engineering techniques to trick users into target networks. The embezzled funds were transferred to e-mail addresses controlled by North Korea, according to the report.
Many of last year 's attacks were most likely carried out by Lazarus, a group of hackers who have been sanctioned by the United States on charges of belonging to Pyongyang' s intelligence services.
The Lazarus group has been accused of involvement in ransomware attacks with the WannaCry virus, which targeted bank accounts, as well as the major cyber-attacks of 2014 against Sony Pictures, following the debut of a film about North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
According to Chainalysis, North Korea also appears to have stepped up its efforts to launder stolen cryptocurrencies, using software tools called mixers to raise money from thousands of digital addresses and redirect them to new ones.
Source: in.gr