South Korea confirms North Korean hacker as the perpetrator of the Upbit exchange attack in 2019, recovering 4.8 BTC after 4 years

South Korean police have officially confirmed that the notorious North Korean hacker group Lazarus is behind the attack on the cryptocurrency exchange Upbit in November 2019. This attack resulted in the theft of 342,000 ETH, equivalent to about 49 million USD at that time, and today this amount is estimated to reach 1.068 billion USD. On November 21, 2024, after 5 years of investigation, this information was announced, marking the first time the South Korean government officially acknowledged North Korea's involvement in a major cryptocurrency attack.

The police also stated that, during the investigation, approximately 57% of the stolen ETH was converted by the hackers into Bitcoin and dispersed across various exchanges to launder money. By October 2023, South Korean police had discovered 4.8 BTC (equivalent to about 466,000 USD) at an exchange in Switzerland and had recovered this amount for Upbit. However, there are still many other ETH assets being laundered or stored at unidentified exchanges, making recovery difficult.