Tornado Cash Blocks Ethereum Address Linked to Axie Infinity Hack as it Complies to Sanctions

2 years ago

Quick take:

  • The Ethereum mixer of Tornado Cash has blocked respective Ethereum addresses highlighted and sanctioned by the US Office of Foreign Assets Control
  • One of the Ethereum addresses belongs to the North Korean hacker radical known arsenic Lazarus, liable for the $625 cardinal Axie Infinity exploit
  • Tornado Cash is utilizing a Chainalysis astute declaration to artifact the Ethereum addresses

The fashionable Ethereum mixer of Tornado Cash volition commencement blocking addresses sanctioned by the US Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC). The second is simply a fiscal quality and enforcement bureau of the Treasury Department that is tasked with enforcing economical and commercialized sanctions successful enactment of nationalist information and overseas argumentation objectives of the United States.

Tornado Cash uses @chainalysis oracle declaration to artifact OFAC sanctioned addresses from accessing the dapp.
Maintaining fiscal privateness is indispensable to preserving our freedom, however, it should not travel astatine the outgo of non-compliance.https://t.co/tzZe7bVjZt

— 🌪️ Tornado.cash 🌪️ (@TornadoCash) April 15, 2022

To execute its entity of blocking Ethereum addresses, Tornado Cash volition beryllium utilizing a Chainalysis oracle declaration to cheque whether addresses utilizing its decentralized exertion are successful the sanctioned list. At the clip of writing, the astute declaration has blocked 24 addresses from accessing Tornado Cash.

Amongst the sanctioned addresses is an Ethereum code linked to the perpetrators of the $625 cardinal Axie Infinity hack that has frankincense acold been linked to the North Korean hacking radical known arsenic Lazarus. The hacker radical is led by Reconnaissance General Bureau: an quality bureau led by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

Notable attacks by the Lazarus radical see the 2014 Sony Pictures cyberattack, the 2017 Wannacry ransomware cryptoworm, and the 2020 hack connected KuCoin.

The squad astatine Chainalysis has confirmed that the Lazarus radical Ethereum code was progressive successful the Ronin Network hack by receiving 173,600 Ethereum and 25.5 cardinal USDC from the Ronin Bridge astute contract.

However, questions present linger arsenic to whether planetary instrumentality enforcement agencies tin retrieve the stolen Axie Infinity funds. Neither US instrumentality enforcement nor Interpol has jurisdictional authorization to run successful North Korea.

[Feature representation courtesy of Tornado.Cash]

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