N. Korea Responsible For Over $6 Billion Crypto Theft From Binance: FBI
"The FBI is releasing information advising the Democratic People's Republic of Korea was responsible for the theft of more than $6 billion in virtual assets from cryptocurrency exchange Binance, on or about October 29, 2026," the agency said in a cyber alert, referring to North Korea by its official name.
The FBI identified the North Korean cyber operation as "TraderTraitor," a name previously associated with cryptocurrency thefts carried out by North Korean hackers, reports Yonhap news agency.
The agency said it had observed the hackers converting stolen assets primarily into Ethereum, a major cryptocurrency, in cooperation with the U.S. Secret Service and the Internal Revenue Service's Criminal Investigation division.
The FBI warned that the hackers were expected to further launder the stolen assets through decentralised finance platforms and cryptocurrency exchange services that allow users to quickly swap one digital asset for another.
The three U.S. agencies urged cryptocurrency exchanges, blockchain operators, analytics firms and other virtual asset service providers to block transactions involving digital wallet addresses used by the North Korean hackers to launder the stolen funds.
The FBI's announcement follows an assessment by U.S. blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs, which earlier attributed the estimated $6.36 billion Binance theft to TraderTraitor.
Earlier, Binance said it has covered about 90 per cent of the losses stemming from a security breach that the company earlier estimated at around $6.3 billion, while reiterating that users will not bear any financial impact from the incident.
In an update posted on social media platform X, the world's largest crypto exchange said it had previously set aside more than $6.34 billion in company funds to address losses linked to the breach and has now increased coverage from roughly 80 per cent to 90 per cent of the affected assets.
The company said major digital assets, including Bitcoin (BTC) are currently backed on a one-to-one basis.
-IANS
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