North Korean Hackers Have Stolen $2billion

North Korea has stolen $2 billion by launching cyber attacks on financial organisations and crypto-currency exchanges and  the money has been used to buy military equipment. 

United Nations experts say North Korea used cyberspace to launch increasingly sophisticated attacks to steal funds from financial institutions and cryptocurrency exchanges to generate income. They also used cyber-space to launder the stolen money. According to a report submitted to the UN Security Council committee, the widespread and “increasingly sophisticated” attacks saw North Korean hackers stealing funds and attempting to launder the stolen money. 

The leaked UN Report, said the DPRK hackers target the financial institutions and crypto exchanges across 17 countries.
The report also cites two 2018 bank attacks that, like the Bangladesh Bank incident, tapped into the Swift messaging system: a $10 million theft from Banco de Chile and a $13.5 million ATM cash-out hit on Cosmos Bank in India. "Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) cyber actors, many operating under the direction of the Reconnaissance General Bureau, raise money for its WMD (weapons of mass destruction) programs, with total proceeds to date estimated at up to $2 billion," the report said. 

Crypto-currencies were targeted by hackers because they are less easy to trace. According to the leaked UN report, the attacks on crypto-currency exchanges allowed North Korea “to generate income in ways that are harder to trace and subject to less government oversight and regulation than the traditional banking sector.” 

The news North Korea is using cyberspace to steal cryptocurrencies and mine bitcoin isn’t new. In March, a UK report said North Korean hackers had stolen around $571 million across at least five cryptocurrency exchanges in Asia between January 2017 and September 2018. 

The leaked UN report shows just how developed the nation’s capabilities are becoming, says Philip Ingram, a former colonel in British military intelligence. “The worrying thing is: If they can do this, they are just as capable of stealing intellectual property (IP), enabling them to maintain their scientific and engineering development.”

Additionally, Ingram says, it raisesquestions about who the country is buying its weapons from. “Who are the countries ignoring international sanctions and supplying advance engineering capability and weapons or weapons parts to North Korea? They don't need the money for internal use.”

A spokesman for international insurance firm AMTrust Europe says the move shows the regime “looking at cyber to level the playing field”. However, they don't see North Korea as a big threat when compared with the combined power and funding of the big 5Eyes Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK and the US. 

North Korea's state-sponsored hacking crews are breaking into online stores to insert malicious code that can steal buyers' payment card details as they visit the checkout page and fill in payment forms.Attacks on online stores have been going on since May 2019, according to the  Dutch cybersecurity firm SanSec.

The fact that North Korean hackers have been involved in web skimming incidents is not a surprise to industry experts, as they have consistently gravitated towards any type of cybercrime that can generate a profit.

The US government also has said it wants to seize 113 crypto-currency accounts associated with North Korean money laundering, a high-tech cat-and-mouse-style conflict in which money launderers have turned to elaborate automated schemes to conceal their cryptocurrency transactions and frustrate law enforcement.

Forbes:       FinExtra:        ZDNet:       MITechnolgy Review:

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