Tradertraitor: Kings of Effectiveness

On February 21, The most encrypted theft began to appear. Infiltrators I gained control of an encryption wallet It belongs to the second largest encrypted currency exchange in the world, bybit, and stealing approximately $ 1.5 billion in digital symbols. Soon they reduced the money between dozens of coded currency portfolios and services to try to block the activity, before starting to pay the stolen money outside.

The digital eye raid had all the distinctive features of a group of elite infiltrators in North Korea. While the bybit remained the solvent by borrowing the cryptocurrency and fired a The reward scheme to track down Stolen funds, FBI quickly She was blamed North Korean infiltrators known as Tradertraitor.

Before the Bybit theft, Tradertraitor has already been linked with a high -level encrypted currency and compatibility in the supply chain program.

“We were waiting for the next big thing,” said Michael Barnhart, a long -standing cybersecurity researcher, who focuses on North Korea at DTEX Systems. “They didn’t go far. They didn’t try to stop. They were conspiring and placing clearly – they were doing it now,” he says.

north koreaSnements – along with those from China, Russia and Iran – are considered one of the most advanced and more dangerous electronic threats to Western democracies. While all of these countries are involved in spying and stealing sensitive data, North Cyber ​​operations come with a set of its distinctive goals: helping to finance the Kingdom of the hermit Nuclear programs. Increasingly, this means stealing the cryptocurrency.

During at least the past five years, the authoritarian regime has been published by Kim Jong Un Technically skilled Workers To infiltrate companies All over the world And earn wages that can be sent to the motherland. In some cases, after being expelled, these former workers are invented by threatening to issue sensitive data. Meanwhile, North Korea, infiltrators, as part of the broad canopy Lazaros GroupThe billions in the cryptocurrency were stolen from exchanges and companies all over the world. Trainrtraitor composition One From the broader Lazarus Group, which is running out of the North Korean Intelligence Agency.

Tradertraitor – which is also referred to as Jade Sleet, Slo Bisses and UC4899 By security companiesIn the first place in the cryptocurrency.

“They use a variety of creative technologies to enter Blockchain, cryptocurrency, anything related to platforms, trading forums, and all of those different things about cryptocurrency and decentralized financing,” says Sherrod Digero, director of the Microsoft threat strategy. “The Jade Sleet (Tradertraitor) group is one of the most advanced groups at this level,” says Jade Sleet (Tradertraitor).

Cyber ​​Security researchers say that Tradertraitor appeared for the first time at the beginning of 2022, and it is possible that there will be a branch of the APT38 group in North Korea that penetrated the rapid financial system and Try to steal one billion dollars From the central bank of Bangladesh at the beginning of 2016. “At that moment you have a real and important shift.”

Barnhart says North Korea has realized that relying on other people – such as financial mules – could make its operations less effective. Instead, they can steal the cryptocurrency. Two groups of this tactical transformation appeared, says Barnhart, CryptoCore and Tradertraitor. “The trader is the most sophisticated ever,” he says. “And why? Because Apt38 was the team.”