The U.S. Treasury Department has added three wallet addresses on Ethereum to the sanctions. The three addresses are believed to be linked to the hacker group behind the theft of more than $600 million in cryptocurrency from the Ronin Sidechain of the NFT Axie Infinity game.
In an update on Friday, the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Management (OFAC) included three addresses on Ethereum in specially designated National Restrictions on North Korea's Lazarus Group. U.S. authorities, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency, have been paying attention to the group since they were involved in the theft of more than 173,600 Ether (ETH) and $25.5 million (USDC) coins from sidechain Ronin in March 2022. At the time, these tokens were worth more than $600 million.
The government agency said that these addresses were added to the banned list. This is an attempt to prevent North Korea from avoiding sanctions by the United States and the United Nations. Blockchain data shows that at least one of the wallet addresses linked to the Ronin hackers sent money to money theft services, including Tornado Cash.
OFAC added 3 virtual currency wallet addresses to the SDN Listing for Lazarus Group. The DPRK has relied on illicit activities like cybercrime to generate revenue while trying to evade US & UN sanctions. Transacting w/ these risks exposure to US sanctions. https://t.co/GMNZkwe1IA
— Treasury Department (@USTreasury) April 22, 2022
Chainalysis reported in January 2022 that North Korea had stolen about 400 million cryptocurrencies through cyberattacks by 2021. To date, the Ronin case is probably the nation's largest heist. Illegal funds linked to hacker groups from the mysterious country are mostly Ether, accounting for 58%, Bitcoin at 20%, and other tokens at 22%.
The addition of these ETH addresses to the sanctions list is the latest move by OFAC to detect digital assets used as a way to raise funds by governments that are subject to sanctions. In April 2022, the government agency also announced that it was eyeing russia's Hydra darknet market and cryptocurrency exchange Garantex for allegedly being involved in payments from Ransomware attacks and other tech crimes. Cryptocurrency mining company BitRiver is also on this list.
