US charges 3 N Koreans in $1.3bn hacking spree
The United States has charged three North Korean computer programmers with a massive hacking spree aimed at stealing more than $1.3bn in money and cryptocurrency, affecting companies from banks to Hollywood movie studios, the Department of Justice said yesterday. The indictment alleges that the accused stole money while working for North Korea’s military intelligence services. FBI said all three were believed to be in North Korea.
The US has charged three North Korean computer programmers with a massive hacking spree aimed at stealing more than $1.3bn in money and cryptocurrency, affecting companies from banks to Hollywood movie studios, the department of justice said yesterday.
The indictment alleges that Jon Chang Hyok, 31, Kim Il, 27, and Park Jin Hyok, 36, stole money while working for North Korea’s military intelligence services. Park had previously been charged in a complaint unsealed in 2018.
Kristi Johnson, the FBI assistant director in charge for the Los Angeles Field Office, said in a telephone news briefing that all three were believed to be in North Korea.
The North Korean mission to the United Nations in New York did not immediately respond to requests for comment and contact details for the trio couldn’t immediately be found.
The justice department said the hackers were responsible for a wide range of criminal activity and high-profile intrusions, including a retaliatory November 2014 attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment for producing The Interview, which depicted the assassination of North Korea’s leader.
The justice department also alleged that the trio participated in the creation of the destructive WannaCry 2.0 ransomware — which hit Britain’s National Health Service particularly hard when it was set loose in May 2017.
The indictment pins the blame on the hackers for breaking into banks across south and southeast Asia, Mexico, and Africa by breaking into the financial institutions’ networks and abusing the SWIFT protocol, and deploying malicious applications from March 2018 through September 2020 targeting cryptocurrency applications.