17-1-2024 (SINGAPORE) A report from the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime (UNODC) reveals that North Korean hackers are collaborating with fraudsters and drug traffickers in South-East Asia, sharing money-laundering and underground banking networks. The Mekong area, encompassing Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia, has witnessed instances of such cooperation, with the notorious Lazarus Group, affiliated with North Korea, being involved.
While the UNODC report did not provide detailed information, it stated that the observations were made based on case analysis and blockchain data. The shared activities between hackers and criminals have raised concerns about the increasing involvement of casinos and cryptocurrency exchanges in facilitating organized crime operations.
In response to the UNODC report, a representative from North Korea’s mission to the United Nations in Geneva, who chose to remain anonymous, claimed to be unaware of the issue and dismissed previous reports on Lazarus as speculation and misinformation.
Lazarus Group, believed to be controlled by North Korea’s primary intelligence bureau, has been linked to various high-profile cyberheists and ransomware attacks. The funds stolen by North Korean hackers serve as a significant source of funding for Pyongyang and its weapons programs.
According to the report, South-East Asia’s casinos and junkets, which cater to high-wealth gamblers, along with unregulated cryptocurrency exchanges, have become integral components of the banking infrastructure used by organized crime in the region. The casinos have proven to be effective in moving and laundering substantial amounts of cryptocurrency and traditional cash, evading detection and providing channels for integrating billions of dollars in illicit proceeds into the formal financial system.
Infiltrated by organized crime, the junket sector has been implicated in large-scale money laundering and underground banking operations, with connections to drug trafficking and cyberfraud, as highlighted in the report.