A recent report released by United Nations says that North Korea is trying to come out of the repercussions of sanctions by launching cyberattacks on Bitcoin exchanges and those buying them.
Therefore, the Kim Jong Un nation is said to have launched over 17 attacks on companies operating in over 35 countries and more such crypto stealing campaigns are due to be launched by the end of Sept this year.
From the day the entire world, especially the United States has imposed heavy trade sanctions on the Kim Jong led nation, the leader of North Korea is reported to have ordered his cyber forces to launch various cyber-attack campaigns to steal currency from banks, cryptocurrency from exchange sites & users and crypto mining agents.
Among the victims, South Korea’s Bithumb happens to be the worst hit as it was reportedly attacked four times in the past 2 years as the overall currency loss was estimated to be $51 million.
Cryptojacking happens to be one of the favorite vectors for the state-funded actors from North Korea where malware is fraudulently induced into a victim PC which then illicitly uses the resources of the PC to generate cryptocurrency.
The panel of UN security researchers also argues that they discovered a piece of malware targeting PCs in the west, especially the UK, which has the potential to mine Monero and send any accumulated currency to servers located at Kim II Sung University in Pyongyang.
UN report confirms that the cyber attack launched on SWIFT payment system of Bangladesh Central Bank in 2016 was the work on Lazarus Hacking Group of North Korea.
Apart from stealing Crypto Currency from Crypto Exchanges, North Korea is also found to be launching cyber attacks on banks, financial institutions, trading companies, casinos and digital currency businesses operating in at least 17 countries across the world. This includes Poland, India, Thailand, Nigeria, Kenya, Malaysia, Iraq, Taiwan, and Indonesia.
United Nations says that North Korea has accumulated over $2 billion from such campaigns to date.
The objective behind such attacks from North Korea is simple; make themselves financially stable as soon as possible and rule the world by buying commodities from nations which do not abide by the laws of the UN.
