PANews reported on December 26 that the South Korean government announced today sanctions against 15 individuals and one entity from North Korea, who are suspected of engaging in illegal cyber activities, including cryptocurrency theft. The South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated in a statement that these 15 North Korean individuals belong to the 313 Bureau under the Ministry of Mechanical Industry of the Workers' Party of Korea. This department has been under UN Security Council sanctions since 2016 and is responsible for overseeing North Korea's weapons production, including ballistic missile programs. The statement said: 'It is well known that North Korean IT personnel are dispatched by government-affiliated organizations to places such as Russia, Southeast Asia, and Africa, where they conceal their identities, obtain work orders from IT companies around the world, and some are also involved in information theft and cyberattacks.'
A representative from the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs revealed that some sanctioned individuals have stolen cryptocurrency through hacking. However, the ministry refused to disclose the specific identities of those involved in the cryptocurrency theft. One of the sanctioned individuals is named Kim Cheol-min, who infiltrated IT companies in the United States and Canada as an employee, transferring large amounts of foreign currency to Pyongyang. The statement also mentioned that South Korea has imposed sanctions on a North Korean entity that dispatched a large number of North Korean IT personnel overseas and remitted significant amounts of funds to finance the North Korean regime and its military.