FBI Says North Korean Hackers May Try to Sell $40M of Bitcoin
North Korean hackers, including the Lazarus Group and APT38, are believed to be planning to cash out stolen bitcoin worth over $40 million, according to the FBI.
Topics
Posted 8/23/2023, 9:54:00 AM
coindesk.com
Relevant topic timeline:
Main topic: Hackers stole $62 million from Curve Finance, raising concerns about the strength of the decentralized finance ecosystem.
Key points:
1. Curve Finance is one of the largest decentralized exchanges (DEX) with $1.67 billion in total value locked (TVL).
2. Several DeFi projects' pools were also hacked, resulting in significant losses.
3. The hack was caused by a bug in older versions of the Vyper compiler contract programming language.
4. The hack represents about 4% of Curve's TVL, but a white hat hacker returned $5.4 million to Curve.
5. The hack highlights ongoing challenges and vulnerabilities in the crypto space.
The FBI has seized $1.7 million worth of cryptocurrencies, including significant amounts of Ether and stablecoins, from March to July of this year, primarily from hardware wallets and Binance accounts.
Two significant Bitcoin transfers have sparked speculation within the crypto community, as they coincide with the recent FBI warning about funds associated with North Korean hacker groups, Lazarus Group and APT38, being on the move, raising concerns of a potential sell-off and decline in Bitcoin's value.
A Hong Kong crypto exchange, HashKey, will begin retail trading on August 28, allowing residents to invest up to 30% of their net worth into cryptocurrencies with a warning if the limit is exceeded; meanwhile, China is cracking down on private blockchain firms, arresting crypto executives and seizing assets, and the FBI has traced down $41 million in Bitcoin stolen by North Korean hackers from various projects.
The FBI has flagged six Bitcoin wallets linked to North Korean hacking group Lazarus, containing 1,580 BTC worth $40 million believed to be hoarded from various cryptocurrency hacks, and warned crypto companies to be vigilant and track any movement of funds from these wallets.
A hacker group, suspected to be Lazarus with ties to the North Korean government, stole $37.3 million in cryptocurrency from Estonia's CoinsPaid after tricking an engineer with a fake job offer.
An alleged hacker made suspicious withdrawals totaling $16 million from the crypto gambling site Stake.com, raising concerns about stolen funds and the security of crypto gambling platforms.
Hackers behind the $41 million hack of cryptocurrency casino Stake have moved an additional $328,000 million worth of Polygon and BNB tokens to the Avalanche blockchain, bringing the total transferred funds to $4.8 million, representing 1.2% of the total stolen amount.
CoinEx, a global cryptocurrency exchange, suffered a hack where large amounts of digital assets were stolen, with preliminary estimates suggesting a loss of around $43 million, possibly linked to the North Korean hacking group Lazarus.
According to a report, the value of illicit foreign exchange transactions conducted with digital currency in South Korea was estimated to be $4 billion last year, prompting regulators to focus on the unregulated over-the-counter (OTC) crypto market.
Hong Kong-based cryptocurrency exchange CoinEx has confirmed that compromised private keys allowed hackers to steal over $70 million worth of tokens, and is working on rebuilding its wallet system to restore functionality and compensate affected users.