Several crypto-related firms join forces to freeze over $1 million worth of crypto from Lazarus Group.
Binance, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in terms of daily trading volumes, and crypto exchange Huobi froze another batch of funds tied to the $100 million Harmony Horizon bridge hack.
According to the report shared by blockchain analytics firm Elliptic, on February 14th, both crypto exchanges froze approximately $1.4 million worth of crypto.
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The blockchain analytics firm claims that recently, Elliptic investigators noticed an increase in “complex chains of transactions, to exchanges” from wallets related to North Korean hackers Lazarus Group. The company revealed that it promptly notified several crypto exchanges about the matter.
When talking about the movement of funds, Elliptic chief executive officer (CEO) Simone Maini noted:
Today, money laundering was detected and stolen funds linked to North Korea were frozen, in real time. As an industry we have the power and responsibility to prevent digital assets becoming a haven for money launderers and sanctions evaders, and ensure that they are a force for good.
Based on the report, Elliptic investigators traced the entirety of stolen funds sent through Tornado Cash, the crypto privacy mixer sanctioned by the US Office of Foreign Assets Control.
At the time of writing, it is unclear what tokens or coins crypto exchanges froze.
It is not the first time, Binance and Huobi joined forces to freeze funds related to the Harmony Horizon bridge exploit. In January, crypto exchanges froze and recovered 121 Bitcoin (BTC) worth approximately $2.5 million at the time it was obtained.
The Harmony Horizon bridge exploit has been one of the biggest hacks of 2022. During the exploit, malicious actors obtained around $99.6 million worth of crypto.
For quite some time, the crypto community speculated on who was behind this attack. The end to speculations came on January 24th, when the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) attributed the hack to the North Korean Lazarus Group.
