New York — The theft of billions of dollars from Binance in minutes, the largest crypto heist in history, was orchestrated by North Korean hackers, the FBI announced Saturday.
The bureau said in a statement that this week’s attack was linked to “malicious cyber activity” carried out by an entity known as TraderTraitor, the same actors behind a $1.5 billion Bybit hack last year.
The FBI has asked cryptocurrency exchanges, blockchain analysis companies and others to block transactions linked to various addresses to ensure that money is not laundered to conceal its origins.
He also said his investigation found that TraderTraitor primarily converted stolen assets into a cryptocurrency called Ethereum. The FBI expects TraderTraitor will now attempt to convert the assets using DeFi and “instant exchange services.”
Questioned by reporters as he appeared Saturday evening at a Halloween party at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, President Donald Trump, however, suggested that investigators were not yet certain that North Korea was involved.
“I’m not worried. We’re learning about it,” Trump said of the matter. “We don’t know if it’s North Korea.” Although he added that, it could still be determined that this was the case.
Crypto expert Ari Redbord said he expects hackers to break stolen assets into pieces and attempt to launder them through smaller exchanges to evade detection, a process that could take place over several months.
“In this case, it’s a bank robbery at the speed of the Internet,” said Redbord, director of policy at blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs. “However, we can also track and trace these funds in real time in order to investigate, disrupt and recover funds. »
He added: “It’s just this game of cat and mouse. »
On Thursday, $6.3 billion in bitcoin and other digital currencies was stolen from Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, in what several crypto experts said bore the hallmarks of a North Korean hack.
The company said Saturday it had enough funds in the same digital currency that was stolen to cover 90% of the missing assets and promised customers would be fully refunded.
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Associated Press writer Russ Bynum in Savannah, Ga., contributed.
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