According to a new United Nations report, Kim Jong-Un has mastered the hacking of old and new financial systems to funnel billions of dollars into its nuclear weapons program, as published Infobae
By Miami Diario Newsroom
About $2.000 billion has been amassed by North Korean agents, through the theft of money from financial institutions and cryptocurrency exchanges, according to a panel that monitors the implementation of UN sanctions in a report to the Security Council.
This is not the first time they come to light the international crimes of the Kim Jong-Un regime. Last year, dozens of reports from cybercrime of North Korean hackers reached all over the world. North Korea, with or without the help of its closest ally, China, has taken it upon itself to expand its army of hackers.
Kim Jong-Un is estimated to have about "30 foreign representatives who control bank accounts and facilitate transactions, including for illicit transfers of coal and oil“, according to the report.
As is known, the North Korean regime has invested money, time and personnel to create an army of hackers. The goal is Launch cyber attacks on banks or cryptocurrency sites for the purpose of stealing large amounts of funds.
Therefore, hacks from North Korea are not new. On May 24, 2018, a group of North Korean hackers launched an attack on the Banco de Chile. To do this, they designed a virus that penetrated the bank's system, completely disabling the functionality of its computers and exposing its customers' data. More of 9 thousand bank terminals were affected, misleading bank officials.
It is known that while Banco de Chile's computer security team was working on the community restoration of its internal system, hackers took advantage of the moment to commit their misdeeds. Thousands of banking operations were executed, managing to steal about 10 million dollars. Within minutes, North Korean hackers managed to pull off a multimillion-dollar riot, right under the nose of a top bank's cybersecurity team.
El National Bank of Foreign Trade (Bancomext) was the target of a similar robbery by the North Korean regime in January of that year. Sony was the victim of a hack when they tried to stop the premiere of a movie –The Interview– who made fun of the dictator.
According to a report prepared by the cybersecurity company Mcafee, This army of hackers has increased its operations in recent times. In this way, it is evident that during the last 2 years there has been an increase in attacks from North Korea. The targets of their operations are white banks, financial entities, governments, oil companies and other institutions of both the United States, Latin America y Europe.
Thank you McAfee. to the assistance of security agencies of nations that are concerned about interference with their companies and their official dependencies, managed access one of the cybernetic barracks of the dictatorship. . During the window that the entry to one of his servers lasted, the computer security company observed in real time how more than a hundred firms around the world were hit by hackers.
According to the McAfee team, the cities that received the most hits were: New York, Houston, London, Madrid, Tokyo, Tel Aviv, Rome, Bangkok, Seoul, Taipei y Hong Kong. And the areas attacked were varied: from banks and financial entities to companies dedicated to the extraction of oil and gas. From firms dedicated to nuclear technology to non-governmental organizations.
According to UN report,continuous ace shortcomings in the implementation of financial sanctions by member states, combined with the deceptive practices of the DPRK, allowed the country to continue accessing the international financial system».
The report adds that “Large-scale attacks on cryptocurrency exchanges allow the DPRK to generate revenue in ways that are more difficult to trace and subject to less government oversight and regulation than the traditional banking sector.”
North Korea's Foreign Ministry on Tuesday renewed its threat to take a "new road» in negotiations with the United States.
According to the UN report, another major source of foreign exchange for North Korea is the army of tech workers, trained to break the best security systems in the world.
It was found out that hundreds of North Koreans are deployed in Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East to work as programmers and software developers. They earn between USD 3.000 and USD 5.000 per month and pay most of their salaries to entities controlled by North Korea.. To hide their national identity, local citizens serve as nominal bosses of the companies that employ them, which in turn receive payments from North Koreans, according to this account.
Following missile launches and nuclear weapons tests by North Korea in 2017, the UN Security Council imposed three rounds of sanctions on Pyongyang, including bans on exports of iron, coal, lead, seafood and textiles, as well as some restrictions on oil imports.
The truth is that the report's revelations come a day after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un supervised the latest projectile launches by Pioyang on Tuesday. The dictator said that these suppose a «advertisements» to Seoul and Washington, the official media of his regime reported today.
With information of: Infobae