3 hours ago
South Korean authorities person successfully recovered 4.8 Bitcoin (BTC), which was linked to the 2019 hack of the Upbit exchange, section media outlet Yonhap News reported connected Nov. 21.
The incident, successful which North Korean hackers stole 342,000 Ethereum (ETH), was among the astir important cyberattacks targeting a cryptocurrency platform. The stolen Ethereum, valued astatine $41.4 cardinal successful 2019, is present worthy implicit $1 cardinal astatine existent prices.
The investigation
South Korea’s National Police Agency’s probe confirmed the engagement of North Korean hacker groups Lazarus and Andariel successful the Upbit 2019 hack. These groups are notorious for large-scale cybercrime and person stolen much than $3 cardinal successful cryptocurrency from 2017 to 2023.
The confirmation marks the archetypal clip South Korean constabulary person officially tied a important hack to North Korean operatives.
Police explained that the hackers laundered 57% of the stolen ETH by converting it into Bitcoin. The funds flowed done 3 North Korea-linked exchanges and 51 planetary platforms.
After years of tracing blockchain enactment and analyzing North Korean IP addresses, investigators identified patterns, including unsocial North Korean connection usage. Support from the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) besides contributed to uncovering the hackers’ operations.
The recovered Bitcoin, which was traced to a Swiss exchange, has been returned to Upbit.
Upbit scrutiny
This improvement arrives arsenic Upbit is nether scrutiny from South Korea’s Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) implicit KYC-related violations. The FIU reports that the speech could beryllium implicated successful arsenic galore arsenic 600,000 compliance breaches.
South Korea’s Financial Services Commission (FSC) has besides flagged concerns implicit Upbit’s marketplace dominance. The speech accounts for astir 20% of the 22 trillion won deposited successful K Bank, raising questions astir imaginable risks to the fiscal system.
According to CoinMarketCap data, Upbit is the largest South Korean crypto trading platform, with a trading measurement of astir $6 billion.
The station South Korea links large crypto heist to North Korea, recovers Bitcoin appeared archetypal connected CryptoSlate.
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