The Associated Press reports that " [1]North Korean hackers have pilfered billions of dollars " by breaking into cryptocurrency exchanges and by creating fake identities to get remote tech jobs at foreign companies — all orchestrated by the North Korean government to finance R&D on nuclear arms.

That's according to a new [2]the 138-page report by a group watching North Korea's compliance with U.N. sanctions (including officials from the U.S., Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Korea and the United Kingdom). [3]From the Associated Press :

> North Korea also has used cryptocurrency to launder money and make military purchases to evade international sanctions tied to its nuclear program, the report said. It detailed how hackers working for North Korea have [4]targeted foreign businesses and organizations with malware designed to disrupt networks and steal sensitive data...

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> Unlike [5]China, Russia and Iran , North Korea has focused much of its cyber capabilities to [6]fund its government , using cyberattacks and fake workers to steal and defraud companies and organizations elsewhere in the world... Earlier this year, hackers linked to North Korea [7]carried out one of the largest crypto heists ever , stealing $1.5 billion worth of ethereum from Bybit. The FBI later linked the theft to a group of hackers working for the North Korean intelligence service.

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> Federal authorities also have alleged that [8]thousands of IT workers employed by U.S. companies were actually North Koreans [9]using assumed identities to land remote work. The workers gained access to internal systems and [10]funneled their salaries back to North Korea's government . In some cases, the workers held several remote jobs at the same time.



[1] https://apnews.com/article/north-korea-cyber-nuclear-russia-un-sanctions-28b6681541a62d809c52e0f2625febc9

[2] https://msmt.info/Publications/detail/MSMT%20Report/4221

[3] https://apnews.com/article/north-korea-cyber-nuclear-russia-un-sanctions-28b6681541a62d809c52e0f2625febc9

[4] https://apnews.com/article/japan-indonesia-south-korea-north-government-c31a92552bdad882b80d6a771e12ac2d

[5] https://apnews.com/article/ai-cybersecurity-russia-china-deepfakes-microsoft-ad678e5192dd747834edf4de03ac84ee

[6] https://apnews.com/article/un-experts-north-korea-cyberattacks-nuclear-sanctions-8e84703049dfb4fda011829115777c9e

[7] https://apnews.com/article/bybit-exchange-crypto-hack-north-korea-7c8335c1397261554138090c2c38f457

[8] https://apnews.com/article/north-korea-weapons-program-it-workers-f3df7c120522b0581db5c0b9682ebc9b

[9] https://apnews.com/article/fbi-justice-department-north-korea-c65e175c6ccd722e691d56121dff9e5e

[10] https://apnews.com/article/north-korea-it-workers-indictments-7beb2f611489da09fe36ee14736b28b9