The FBI has attributed the theft of more than $6 billion in virtual assets from Binance to North Korea, adding a new official finding to the investigation into the exchange’s record-breaking breach. The agency also said North Korean actors were laundering the stolen assets by converting them into Ethereum and warned that further laundering stages are expected.
Reuters reported on October 31 that the FBI made the attribution. The report did not provide a detailed technical account of how the exchange was breached or a figure for how much of the stolen cryptocurrency had been recovered.
The FBI’s attribution follows earlier blockchain investigations. TRM Labs linked the attack to TraderTraitor, a North Korean hacking group, based on on-chain and off-chain intelligence. Binance has not publicly confirmed the attackers’ identity. The exchange’s initial investigation pointed to a potentially compromised DevOps engineer’s laptop and unauthorized transactions through a service container, as detailed in Abijita’s breach report and coverage of TRM’s attribution.
The FBI said it expects further laundering stages, meaning investigators and cryptocurrency firms may continue tracking the funds as they move through additional addresses and services.
What users should do
Binance customers should check account notices through the official app or website, review recent account activity, and keep two-factor authentication enabled. Be wary of unsolicited messages or services claiming they can recover stolen crypto, and do not share passwords, recovery phrases or verification codes.
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