FBI says North Korea-backed hackers stole $100 million from crypto firm Harmony's Horizon Bridge

[Eugene]

Source: Business Insider

FBI says North Korea-backed hackers stole $100 million from crypto firm Harmony's Horizon Bridge

Ryan Hogg
Tue, January 24, 2023 at 5:38 AM EST·2 min read

• North Korean groups were behind a $100 million crypto hack last June, the FBI has confirmed.
• State-backed Lazarus Group and APT38 plundered funds from Harmony's Horizon Bridge.
• CEO Changpeng Zhao said Binance helped recover $2.8 million in bitcoin from the hackers.

US prosecutors have confirmed that two hacking groups backed by North Korea were behind a $100 million crypto theft from a California firm last year.

In a statement Monday, the FBI confirmed Lazarus Group and APT38 were behind a hack of crypto group Harmony's Horizon bridge on June 24.

The agency said on January 13, said North Korean cyber actors used a privacy protocol to launder over $60 million worth of ethereum stolen during the June 2022 heist, with a portion sent to several virtual asset service providers and converted to bitcoin.

-snip-

Read more: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/fbi-says-north-korea-backed-103806328.html

[no_hypocrisy]

1. Ignorance asking: How do you get the money back if it was stolen via hacking?

Plus, it's NK. Court won't be of much help.

[Eugene]

2. Difficult but not always impossible. Blockchain is public record and so is unlaundered coin.

Exchanges can blacklist stolen coins and the wallets containing them.

OP article says 11 wallets were seized. Binance and another exchange intervened whan a hacker tried to transfer some of the stolen crypto.

From there authorities can watch the online wallet and catch the persons trying to access it (Bitfinex heist) or crack the theoretically unhackable wallet. Anything in an online hot wallet is reachable.