FBI Says North Korean Hacker Group Lazarus Behind Crypto Theft at Axie Infinity

The U.S. Department of Treasury along with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has accused the infamous North Korean hacker group, Lazarus, of the $625 million hack at Axie Infinity last month, the biggest hack in crypto’s 13 years of history. Before the Axie Infinity hack, the $450 million Mt Gox hack was the biggest crypto hack. 18% of the Stolen Funds Already Laundered In an updated list of sanctions by the Treasury Department, an Ethereum wallet address tied to the Ronin exploit. The Ronin network powers the play-to-earn game Axie Infinity. The developer behind the Axie Infinity game, Sky Mavis created the network to get around Ethereum network congestion. “Through our investigations we were able to confirm Lazarus Group and APT38, cyber actors associated with [North Korea], are responsible for the theft,” the FBI said in a statement on Thursday. Blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis later tweeted that the sanctioned address was indeed linked to the involved group in the Ronin hack. The Ronin Network also confirmed that the FBI had attributed the Ronin validator security breach to the Lazarus Group. THREAD: Updates to OFAC’s SDN designation for Lazarus Group confirm that the North Korean cybercriminal group was behind the March hack of Ronin Bridge, in which over $600 million worth of ETH and USDC was stolen. — Chainalysis (@chainalysis) April 14, 2022 Altogether, the attacker stole about 173,600 WETH and 25.5 millio...