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North Korean Hackers Nabbed $400M of Crypto in 2021 -Breaking

by Mike Robinson

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© Reuters. Chainalysis: North Korean hackers seize $400M worth of crypto in 2021
  • Chainalysis claims that hackers from North Korea are responsible for extracting cryptocurrency worth $400 million in 2021.
  • The analytics company claims that hackers have more than doubled the thefts they made via cyber attacks since 2019.
  • Hackers from North Korea targeted investment companies and central exchanges.

According to Chainalysis’s latest data, hackers from North Korea have used cyber attacks to steal $400 million of cryptocurrency. Hackers have increased their crypto thefts since 2019, with (ETH) taking the largest share of stolen cryptos.

According to the report from the blockchain analytics company, the number of stolen cryptos has increased significantly since January 13. The hackers pinned BTC as the most stolen cryptocurrency in 2017. It now accounts for only one fifth of the total.

In 2021, Ether was 58% and 22% of the stolen funds respectively. The remaining 20% were ERC-20 or other altcoins. According to the report, hackers targeted investment companies and central exchanges. They also used code exploits, social engineering techniques, malware, and phishing lures.

Chainalysis identified hackers such as Lazarus Group (APT) in its advanced persistent threats list. Their threats have increased over the last three years with the most recent theft of more than $500 million in cryptos. They used sophisticated coin swaps and mixing techniques, such as chain hopping and peel chain to conceal the stolen funds.

Mixing was used to mix 65% of stolen funds 2021, which represents a threefold increase in the amount since 2019. Mixer is software-based privacy technology that hides the origin and destination of coins. Hackers mostly prefer decentralized exchanges (DEX), as they do not require permission to use and have sufficient coin liquidity to swap as per the user’s wish.

A report about a Liquid.com hack on August 19, 2021 revealed that $91 Million of cryptocurrency was lost. This is typical of North Korean hackers’ methods of laundering money. First, they exchanged ERC-20 coins at DEXs for ETH. Next, the ETH went to a mixer, where it was exchanged for BTC. BTC was then sent to the mixer and exchanged for fiat.

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