Nuclear bomb! North Korea finances them with stolen cryptocurrencies

According to a secret UN report, Pyongyang has given the order for hackers to steal digital assets for use in military projects

FrayMSFollow

Jun 2, 20226 min de lectura

By the end of 2021, North Korea and especially Pyongyang, its largest city, was seen as the territory where there was more crypto traffic through cyber attacks.

The practically unknown territory for the countries of the world has few internet possibilities, but of the only 1000 IP addresses they possess, almost 80% are used for businesses of this type.

These computer tricks are sponsored by the dictatorial regime of Kim Jong-un, to obtain foreign currency to pay for the high costs of its military weapons and nuclear bombs.

UN report on North Korea

The report, which was wanted to keep an air of secrecy, was made public only a few hours ago. And it brings back the issue of the Kim dynasty's plan, which has been under UN sanctions since 2006.

Said document mentions in conclusion that North Korea finances a great nuclear plan. It starts from materials for nuclear bombs, assembly and tests.

This, while groups of high stature in computer systems steal millions of currencies cryptographically, to help the high expense that a nuclear plan consists of.

It has been estimated that although the economy that North Korea manages is now a great diversity of illicit activities, cyberattacks on hot wallets have been its most lucrative activity in recent years.

UN against North Korea

North Korea is one of the most resilient and mysterious countries for the United Nations Organization (UN), what is very certain is that none of this secrecy is good for a nation.

This is less than more for the citizens of said western territory, who have paid for the constant sanctions imposed on the country by the UN.

These sanctions and demands to put pressure on the Kim Jong-un dictatorship come not only for the reason of having various evidence of crimes against humanity against its citizens.

Also, for continuing to experiment with nuclear weapons. This incidence after the country promised to stop carrying them out.

Although the international organization believed that it could defeat the Kim dynasty, it did not take into consideration an internal entity of the regime, the office 39. With this administration, the Kim regime has been afloat since long before those sanctions, which seem useless.

What is office 39?

Although the North Korean government has never talked about this fundamental organ for its economy, or actually the money with which the head of state finances his expensive life.

In recent years, there have been North Koreans who have escaped from the clutches of this so-called office 39. They have declared that it is a mafia created by the Kim dynasty, and that its existence has been recorded since the 70s.

It is created for the purpose of earning foreign exchange and managing it for the supreme leader of North Korea.

$400 million stolen in cryptocurrencies

At the beginning of the year, the study carried out by the blockchain incident and information company, Chainalysis, revealed the monitoring that they had been targeting South Korea since mid-2018.

Cyber attacks were planned and directed as a kind of social engineering, where they used various types of decoys, malware, phishing, among other methods.

With the sole objective of sending different funds immediately to other addresses, where they combine and then launder the money.

Hot wallets or hot wallets, which are all those virtual wallets connected to the Internet, have been their main activity for a few years now.

In 2021 alone, a total of 7 strong attacks by North Korean hackers were stipulated, ordered from this Asian country, where a total of USD $400 million was obtained.

In which, Ether (ETH) was the most stolen among all other crypto forms, to be followed by ERC-20 tokens, Altcoins, and Bitcoin (BTC).

Funds sent to the Kim empire

The funds collected with this activity in which crypto assets are profited illegally, are carefully laundered before falling into the hands of the dictator of this territory.

So you can pay and buy through these currencies in US dollars, without any problem.

Which prompts you to think about the real threat that North Korea poses to cryptographic security right now, and for years to come.

Are cybercriminals forced by the government?

Although there is a group of hackers called Lazarus Group, at "informational" doors it is nothing more than a group far removed from the governance of the Democratic Republic of Korea.

The organs that follow Kim Jong-un keep their mouths shut on this case. But they take several admission reports from kids who maintain a great understanding of numbers from a very young age, often forcing them to study programming.

It is thought that these hackers receive nothing or only a pittance from the illicit jobs that bring so much currency to their leader. In other words, they probably have no other options to survive this regime.

This is a guideline that has been followed since the arrival of computers in the country, exactly in the 1980s. Until now , it is believed that there are 1,000 or 1,800 hackers who are forced to work for and by the government.

What has financed the theft and laundering of cryptocurrencies in the last 2 years?

A curious fact is that the North Koreans are believed to have invented WannaCry, one of the strongest worms to penetrate networks. North Korean hackers have become feared all over the net for this reason.

They have made a large sum of money from several of these perpetrations on centralized entities that have paid for Kim Jong-un's latest toys.

Such as the latest missile tests tested in September 2021, and the hypersonic warhead carrier rocket launched on January 6, 2022.

This is one of the little information we have about North Korea, which has been shared with the rest of the world. Let us remember that North Korea is a part of the world where sources of information almost do not exist.

Meanwhile, the UN is devising a plan to unbalance the great mafia and great source of income that the supreme leader of North Korea has found, but it seems that the next steps of this president are well planned.