North Korea’s Cyber Crime Spree: Kim Jong Un’s Hacker Unit Steals Trillions, Part 2

North Korea has conducted 58 hackings in the last six years, stealing KRW 4 trillion

The U.S. government has also warned the international community that North Korean IT technicians are working remotely while hiding their nationality and other identities. In line with this, sanctions against North Korea’s cyber-hacking activities have been consistently implemented. For example, in response to North Korea’s reconnaissance satellite launch, eight North Korean nationals, including the hacking organization “Kimsuky,” were added to the sanctions list.

Recently, the FBI released a wanted list. The main guy is the North Korean Sim Hyon-sop. The reward is a whopping 5 million dollars. He is suspected of remitting the foreign currency earned by North Korean hackers to North Korea. Known to be affiliated with the North Korean trade bank Kwangson Bank, Sim Hyon-sop reportedly handled money laundering operations after working in China for five years and then moving his base to Dubai.

He is said to have laundered the virtual currency stolen through hacking twice in the Middle East and China and then sent it to North Korea. This is because North Korea cannot use SWIFT, the financial transaction network of global bank communications, due to international sanctions, which leaves it no choice but to secretly cash the hacked money and deliver it directly to North Korea.

The U.S. Treasury Department believes that North Korea has stolen more than $3 billion through 58 hacking incidents over the past six years and transferred it to North Korea. The U.S. Treasury Department sees it as a severe problem, especially as it is estimated that this money has flowed directly into North Korea’s nuclear and missile development funds.

North Korea’s hacking units continue their unrelenting cyber-terrorism against South Korea. At the end of January, the National Intelligence Service announced that North Korea perpetrated 80% of hacking against domestic public institutions. According to the National Intelligence Service, there were an average of 1.62 million hacking attempts per day targeting the domestic public sector last year.

The range of hacking targets is broad, encompassing everything from domestic public institutions to defense industry technologies for manufacturing weapons and agriculture. It was also pointed out that it is a severe issue since even places that shouldn’t be breached are attacked defenselessly.

In particular, the National Intelligence Service explains that North Korea’s hacking crimes are directly led by Kim Jong Un, who personally picks the targets and objectives of the attacks.

It has been found that the attack targets have been changed from time to time according to Kim Jong Un’s instructions. When North Korea suffered from food shortages early last year, it focused on domestic agricultural research institutes. After his mention of strengthening naval power in August and September last year, it was found that South Korean shipbuilding companies got hacked, and blueprints and design data were stolen.

Part 1…
Part 3…