Security News > 2021 > February > U.S. Accuses North Korean Hackers of Stealing Millions

Multiple spear-phishing campaigns targeting U.S. aerospace companies, defense contractors, energy companies, technology companies, the U.S. Department of Defense and the U.S. Department of State.

Cryptocurrency Heists, 2017-2020: Targeting of hundreds of cryptocurrency companies, including stealing $75 million from a Slovenian cryptocurrency company in December 2017; $24.9 million from an Indonesian cryptocurrency company in September 2018; and $11.8 million from a financial services company in New York in August, in which the hackers used the malicious CryptoNeuro Trader application as a backdoor.

"As laid out in today's indictment, North Korea's operatives, using keyboards rather than guns, stealing digital wallets of cryptocurrency instead of sacks of cash, are the world's leading bank robbers," said Assistant Attorney General John Demers of the Justice Department's National Security Division, in a statement issued on Wednesday.

Ghaleb Alaumary of Mississauga, Ontario admitted that he played a role as a money launderer for the North Korean APT. "Alaumary was a prolific money launderer for hackers engaged in ATM cash-out schemes, cyber-enabled bank heists, business email compromise schemes and other online fraud schemes," according to the indictment.

"Alaumary organized teams of co-conspirators in the United States and Canada to launder millions of dollars obtained through ATM cash-out operations, including from BankIslami and a bank in India in 2018.".

Last summer, the U.S. Attorney's Office in Los Angeles charged Abbas in a separate case alleging that he conspired to launder hundreds of millions of dollars from BEC frauds and other scams.

News URL

https://threatpost.com/us-accuses-north-korean-hackers/164039/