Crypto: North Korea denies having hacked Binance and denounces an American “provocation”

North Korea denies any involvement in the cyberattack that hit Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange. Responding to the FBI's accusations, Kim Yo-jong, the sister of supreme leader Kim Jong-un, denounces "absurd rhetoric" and an American "provocation".

Last week, hackers siphoned off wallets from Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange. In less than 20 minutes, cybercriminals stole more than $6 billion in digital assets. This is the biggest heist in the history of cryptos, ahead of the Bybit heist a year earlier.

All suspicion quickly turned to North Korea. Two days after the cyberattack, the FBI officially attributed the attack to TraderTraitor, a hacker gang serving the North Korean regime. A member of the famous Lazarus collective, this gang operates at the request of North Korea's intelligence services. For the FBI, there is no doubt that the country is “responsible” for the theft. In recent years, North Korean hackers have increased attacks on cryptocurrency exchanges and protocols. Last year, they stole more than $2 billion in cryptocurrencies, Chainalysis estimates. Cut off from financial circuits by international sanctions, Pyongyang considers cryptocurrency thefts to be an important source of financing. The money raised would be used in particular to finance the country's nuclear and military program.

Unsurprisingly, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) denies any involvement in the Binance hack. A few days after the cyberattack, Kim Yo-jong, the sister of leader Kim Jong-un, dismissed the FBI accusations during an official speech. She denounces “absurd rhetoric” and “a hackneyed provocation” on the part of the United States.

“This is not the first time that the United States has attempted to spread a distorted image of the DPRK in the international community, blindly associating the DPRK with incidents of “cybercrime” whenever they occur internationally,” says Kim Yo-jong.

According to her, the FBI is trying to make North Korea look like a “cybercriminal state”. Kim Yo-jong adds that the North Korean government's "consistent position" is to "resolutely oppose all kinds of malicious acts in cyberspace." This denial comes as no surprise. Pyongyang has always denied being behind the cyberattacks attributed to North Korean criminal gangs.

At the same time, Binance is trying to turn the page on the cyberattack. This weekend, the platform began to reopen crypto withdrawals, suspended in the wake of the hack. As was to be expected, many customers, burned by the hack, took the opportunity to withdraw their digital assets. On the day of reopening, Binance processed $4.6 billion in withdrawals, compared to just $1 billion in deposits. More than $5 billion has been withdrawn from the platform. Binance assures that withdrawals have now stabilized. The platform is not facing a large capital flight.

Machine-translated from French