The DOJ filed a civil forfeiture complaint alleging that North Korean cyber actors stole millions of dollars' worth of cryptocurrency and then laundered the funds through Chinese OTC cryptocurrency traders. According to the DOJ, North Korea has utilized cyber space to plot "increasingly sophisticated" attacks on financial institutions and cryptocurrency exchanges. The DOJ added that North Korea's cyber actors use the money to fund weapons of mass destruction programs.
In a Complaint filed in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, the DOJ alleged that in July of 2019, North Korean cyber actors stole over 400 million "Proton" tokens from a virtual currency exchange. While the exchange was able to recover some of the tokens, the DOJ found that the cyber actors were still able to liquidate over 100 million tokens. In another attack, the DOJ found that a U.S.-based company administering "ALGO" tokens from the Algorand blockchain was the victim of multiple attacks by North Korean cyber actors.
The DOJ noted that the hacks of virtual currency exchanges follow a civil action announced in March of 2020 after a South Korea-based virtual currency exchange was hacked by North Korean cyber actors that stole approximately $250 million worth of virtual currencies. The DOJ asserted that the attack was conducted through e-mail messages, wire communications and false "Know-Your-Customer" submissions. In addition, the DOJ detailed another attack against a separate exchange that resulted in the theft of almost $50 million' worth of the virtual currency, "Ether."
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