"North Korean Hackers Implanted Malware Through Fake Job Interviews"

[Anchor]

Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, has released a report detailing how a hack involving approximately 8 trillion won took place. It was revealed that North Korean hackers meticulously prepared their attack over a span of five months, even conducting fake job interviews.

Reporter Pyeon Gwanghyeon has the details.

[Reporter]

In a report released on the 3rd local time, Binance pinpointed the timing of North Korea's initial cyberattack attempt as last June.

Investigators found that North Korean hackers tricked an engineer into downloading a malicious program disguised as a work tool, allowing them to acquire personal information of employees working on cryptocurrency wallet-related tasks.

Three months later, they approached another engineer on a job search site by offering a new employment opportunity. During the interview process, they disguised themselves as the chief executive officer and planted malware once again under the pretext of a task, according to the findings.

Binance explained that the hacker organization even managed to obtain authentication keys capable of manipulating company systems using the computers infected in this manner.

The full-scale cryptocurrency theft is believed to have taken place starting around 5:00 a.m. on October 30 Korean time.

Investigators found that the hackers stole some 230 million Ripple tokens in just four minutes, followed by consecutive thefts of Solana, Bitcoin, and Ethereum.

The scale of the damage reached 6.34 billion dollars, which amounts to 8.4 trillion won in South Korean currency.

Binance stated that among this total, 3.8 trillion won worth of assets were frozen or blocked, and that they covered over 98 percent of the losses using internal funds and insurance reserves.

Investigators from TRM Labs, a U.S. analytics firm that pointed the finger at North Korea as the mastermind just six hours after the incident, stated that this hack was the work of the elite North Korean hacking organization TraderTraitor, and warned that South Korean exchanges could be the next target.

(Video Editing: Kim Jong-tae)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.