On October 4, 2024, the U.S. government took legal steps to recover over $2.67 million in digital assets that were allegedly pilfered by North Korea's Lazarus Group.
The action targets approximately $1.7 million in Tether (USDT), linked to a 2022 hack of the Deribit exchange, which suffered losses totaling $28 million.
Following the breach, the hackers funneled the stolen funds through Tornado Cash and multiple Ethereum wallets to obscure their trail. Additionally, the government is pursuing around $970,000 in Avalanche-bridged Bitcoin (BTC.b) stolen during the Lazarus Group’s attack on Stake.com in 2023, which resulted in over $41 million in damages.
The Lazarus Group has been connected to numerous cyberattacks, including the July 2024 hack of WazirX, where about $235 million was taken. A report by onchain analyst ZackXBT highlighted a network of North Korean developers infiltrating at least 25 cryptocurrency projects, using fake identities to exploit vulnerabilities and steal assets.
In response to the group’s activities, the FBI issued warnings in September 2024 regarding scams involving false job offers, where unsuspecting users were tricked into downloading malware disguised as employment documents, leading to potential data breaches.
The U.S. Department of Justice has sentenced Dwayne Golden, 57, of Pennsylvania to 97 months in prison for orchestrating a fraudulent crypto investment scheme that stole over $40 million from investors.
The first half of 2025 has become the most damaging six-month period in crypto history, with over $2.1 billion stolen across 75+ separate incidents, according to new data.
A new breed of cyber-attack is sweeping through crypto media, exploiting site pop-ups and wallet-connect prompts instead of smart-contract bugs.
CoinMarketCap, one of the most widely used crypto data tracking platforms, is reportedly facing a front-end security breach, with multiple users encountering a suspicious prompt to verify their wallets.