The North Korean hacking group, Lazarus Group, is reportedly holding approximately $47 million in cryptocurrency, primarily in Bitcoin, according to data from 21.co collated on Dune Analytics. The wallets linked to Lazarus Group reportedly contain around $42.5 million in BTC, $1.9 million in Ether, $1.1 million in BNB, and an additional $640,000 in stablecoins, primarily Binance USD.
This figure marks a significant drop from the $86 million the group reportedly held on September 6, days after the Stake.com hack in which the Lazarus Group was implicated. Despite their illicit activities, the group reportedly does not hold any privacy coins like Monero, Dash, or Zcash, which are generally more difficult to trace. The wallets associated with the Lazarus Group remain active, with the most recent transaction recorded on September 20.
However, it’s important to note that the reported figures are likely an underestimation of the Lazarus Group’s crypto holdings, as they are based only on publicly available information. The group has been linked to several significant hacks, including an attack on the crypto exchange CoinEx, which lost at least $55 million. The FBI has also implicated the Lazarus Group in the Alphapo, CoinsPaid, and Atomic Wallet hacks, totaling more than $200 million stolen in 2023 alone.
Despite these figures, Chainalysis reports a substantial 80% decrease in crypto thefts by North Korea-linked hackers from 2022, with a total of $340.4 million stolen in crypto as of mid-September 2023, down from a staggering $1.65 billion in 2022.
Amid these revelations, U.S. federal authorities have issued warnings about the “significant risk” of potential attacks by the Lazarus Group on U.S. healthcare and public health sector entities. The activities of the Lazarus Group continue to highlight the significant challenges that global authorities face in tracing and addressing cryptocurrency-related cybercrime, demonstrating the importance of robust cybersecurity measures and global cooperation to tackle these threats effectively.
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