Skip to main content

Notorious hacker group from North Korea: Is Lazarus Group behind the Harmony hack?

 


The Lazarus Group is a well-known North Korean hacker syndicate and is now suspected of being behind the recent Harmony Protocol attack that stole $100 million.


The manner in which Harmony's Horizon Bridge was hacked and how the stolen digital assets were subsequently laundered bears a striking resemblance to other attacks by the Lazarus Group, according to a new report Thursday from blockchain analysis firm Elliptic.


"There is strong evidence that North Korea's Lazarus Group could be behind this theft, given the nature of the hack and the subsequent money laundering."

To do this, Elliptic detailed how the attack was carried out: The Lazarus Group harvested credentials from Harmony employees in Asia Pacific to break into the protocol's security system. After gaining control of the protocol, the hackers deployed automated money laundering schemes that moved the stolen assets late at night.


Elliptic also said the hackers had already transferred more than 40 percent of Tornado Mixer's $100 million . This is an Ethereum-based "mixer service" that obfuscates the transaction data, making it extremely difficult for investigators to track the movements of the money.


The Harmony team has offered a $1 million reward to get the hackers to return the money. On June 29, Harmony increased it to $10 million, saying that if the money were returned in full, the investigation would be closed and no further criminal prosecution would be instituted.


In April, $ 600 million was stolen in a Ronin Bridge hack . This attack was also linked to the Lazarus Group . Due to current market conditions, the value of stolen Ether ( ETH ) has dropped by over 60 percent to $230 million.


According to a recent report by Coinclub.com , North Korea has deployed 7,000 full-time hackers to raise funds through cyberattacks, ransomware, and crypto protocol hacks. North Korea is a global leader in crypto crime. There are over 15 documented cases of cyber attacks that have seen $1.59 billion stolen.


Harmony's Horizon Bridge is the latest case of a token bridge being hacked . Recently, attacks on such bridges have become more common, including Meter, Wormhole, and Ronin. Overall, just over $1 billion was stolen in the attacks in 2022 alone.


The largest token bridge hacked so far was Poly Network in 2021. $610 million was stolen in the process, but has since been returned almost all of it.

My Top Picks
Honeygain - Passive earner that pays in BTC or PayPal
MandalaExchange -The Best no KYC crypto Exchange! 
BetFury - Play And Earn BFG for daily Bitcoin and ETH dividends!
Pipeflare - Faucet that pays in ZCash and Matic, Games pay in DAI
Womplay - Mobile dApp gaming platform that rewards in EOS and Bitcoin
Cointiply - The #1 Crypto Earning Site
Torum - Join the latest Social Network and earn TRM for Free! 
LiteCoinPay - The #1 FaucetPay earner for Litecoin 
LBRY/Odysee - YouTube Alternative that lets you earn Money by viewing videos!
FaucetPay - The #1 Microwallet Platform
FREEBTC - The #1 FaucetPay earner for Satoshi's
FaucetCrypto - An earning/faucet site that pays out instantly
FireFaucet - An earning site that pays better for some than Cointiply
DogeFaucet - Dogecoin Faucet
xFaucet - BTC, ETH, LTC, Doge, Dash, Tron, DGB, BCH, BNB, ZEC, FEY - Claim every 5 minutes
Konstantinova - BTC, ETH, LTC, Doge, Dash, Tron, DGB, BNB, ZEC, USDT, FEY, 25 Claims Daily

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

From offchain to offchain: Statechains meets Lightning

  Without a doubt, the most significant off-chain Bitcoin solution is the Lightning network. But in its wake, the statechain has emerged as an intriguing replacement. There is currently a proposal to link the two offchain networks. From an ocean, for example, you can see sunbeams glistening in the water, waves rippling, and possibly a jellyfish drifting toward the light. But you only see a small portion of it. The distance from the sea's surface to its bottom is hundreds of meters. It has dozens of different fish species swimming in it, crabs and starfish crawling on the bottom, shells clinging to rocks, and sea plants climbing up. A completely new world starts where your gaze diverges. You can picture a blockchain like Bitcoin, just like the sea. What you see on the outside is only a small portion of what is actually there; the set of UTXOs (coins) and transaction history that full nodes store are just the beginning of a much larger world. It's the plan, at least. With Bitcoin...
Post a Comment
Read more

Phishing attack on popular crypto sites tries to empty wallets

  Several major crypto sites such as Etherscan, CoinGecko, DeFi Pulse, and others report malicious pop-ups scammers use to try to trick users into connecting their MetaMask wallets. The phishing attack came from a domain displaying the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) logo. "We are investigating the root cause of this attack to fix the threat as soon as possible," CoinGecko founder Bobby Ong tweeted. The phishing attack appears to have been triggered by a malicious ad script from Coinzilla, a crypto ad network, according to CoinGecko. Etherscan also advises its users not to confirm any transactions that may appear on the website. The attackers attempted to use the hype around the “bored monkeys” non-fungible tokens (NFT) to gain access to the cryptocurrencies of unsuspecting website visitors. Although the websites affected by the scam attempt have reacted in the last few hours and deactivated the advertising pop-up, it is still recommended not to connect your MetaMask wallet to ne...
Post a Comment
Read more

Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs stolen through phishing on Instagram

  Bored Ape Yacht Club ( BAYC ) developers announced on Monday that hackers have hijacked the official Instagram page of the popular NFT collection and posted links to a fake airdrop. Crypto enthusiasts who connected their MetaMask wallet to the rogue website subsequently had their Ape NFTs stolen. Apparently, the attack was planned to coincide with the one-year anniversary of the BAYC collection. This increased the "perceived credibility" of the phishing link. About 100 NFTs are said to have been stolen in the phishing attack . According to CoinGecko data , the minimum price for a BAYC NFT is 139 Ether ( ETH ) or $400,726. So if reports are correct, over $40 million worth of NFTs were stolen in the attack. These numbers are only the lowest estimate, however, as they are based on the lowest price.  At the time of writing, it was still unclear how the hackers gained access to BAYC's official Instagram account. Social media users have pointed out the importance of two-fact...
Post a Comment
Read more