North Korean hackers choose Bitcoin players

North Korea is still in love with Bitcoin, Crypto

Because of its decentralized nature, boundless and resistant to Bitcoin censorship and related technologies, North Korea, the world's most famous hermit state, has taken a liking to this decade-long innovation. But some might argue that North Korea has taken its encryption too much, with a multitude of reports indicating that the nation is exploiting cryptocurrencies for fair financial gain.

As reported by the Ethereum World News in mid-October, Lazarus, an alleged North Korean-based hacker consortium, was held responsible for five cryptocurrency exchange hacks, including the notorious $ 500 million CoinCheck breach. A report from the Group-IB cybersecurity company, which first disclosed this information, indicated that the Lazarus components used social engineering, phishing and malware to visit the relevant databases and access points.

Now, according to the South China Morning Post, Lazarus has set its goals on consumers encrypted by retail, like you or me, who are often not the target of such bigwig hacker collectives.

Simon Choi of IssueMakersLabs, a so-called "cyber warfare research group," recently told the SCMP that while North Korean bitcoin hackers used to target exchanges and their employees, a shift to "common joes" in Economy of cryptocurrencies.

In support of this statement, Kwon Seok-chul, CEO of South Korea's computer security company, Cuvepia, noted that his company has detected at least 30 times that North Korean hackers have attacked cryptocurrency holders from April 2018.

Kwon, emphasizing that the victims were just "simple wallet users," continued to note that the Cuvepia systems probably just took over the tip of the iceberg, adding that "the real number could be well over 100". Explaining the reasoning behind the shift from the lucrative exchange hack, an apparent form of Robinhood-inspired attack, to the violations of individual portfolios, Choi noted that the former group began to strengthen their security efforts.

Binance, for example, recently moved most of the Ethereum-based tokens on which it deposited over $ 1.2 billion, a new, probably safer wallet, as previously reported by Ethereum World News. The cybersecurity researcher explained:

The exchanges have become accustomed to the attacks and have in some way strengthened their security. Direct attacks on exchanges have become more difficult, so hackers are thinking alternately to chase individual users with weak security.

Interestingly, Choi added that North Korean hackers are likely to be directed to South Korean CEOs, many of whom could have billions of won in digital assets, such as Bitcoin.

Although the above statements suggest that Lazarus has completely renounced the attacks, Luke McNamara of FireEye has recently said that the inaugural statements of Lazarus may have contributed to his efforts to target individual users of cryptocurrency. He noticed:

It is possible that from previous intrusions they were able to gather information about e-mail addresses, usernames of people who use these exchanges.

Regardless of the details, the most recent SCMP report on the subject underlines the state's objective to ignore sanctions through the trade, collection and use of cryptocurrencies.

And despite the alleged hackers, other reports indicate that North Korea is still determined to launch its second international crypto- and blockchain-centric conference.

Title Image Courtesy of Markus Spiske on Unsplash