- Blockchain analytics company Elliptic conducted the research.
- Elliptic investigators tracked down the whole amount of stolen monies transmitted.
Binance and Huobi, two major cryptocurrency exchanges, have once again frozen accounts. This time its related to the June 2022 $100 million Harmony Horizon bridge attack. The trading platforms blocked almost $1.4 million in cryptocurrency that was traced to accounts associated with the infamous Lazarus Group in North Korea.
Based on a report published on February 14th, it seems that blockchain analytics company Elliptic conducted the research. The company did not specify what digital currencies were put on hold. Elliptic said it informed Binance and Huobi, and both exchanges swiftly froze accounts associated with the Lazarus Group.
It is generally known that after the Harmony vulnerability, Lazarus Group turned to the now US OFAC-sanctioned privacy mixer Tornado Cash in an effort to obfuscate the trail of transactions leading back to the initial heist.
Amount Frozen Fraction of Stolen $63.5M
The report claims that this makes it simpler to pay out stolen assets at an exchange, however, Elliptic investigators tracked down the whole amount of stolen monies transmitted via the mixer.
Simone Maini, CEO of Elliptic, said that these developments proved the sector was shouldering the burden of preventing money laundering and halting crypto’s transformation into a “haven” for criminal activities.
The US FBI concluded on January 24 that the Lazarus Group was responsible for the assault on the Harmony Bridge. Binance and Huobi have worked together before, so this isn’t the first time they’ve helped each other out.
On January 16th, the two exchanges were able to freeze and retrieve 121 Bitcoin that had been tied to the Harmony assault and were valued at around $2.5 million at the time. However, according to cryptocurrency investigator ZachXBT, the amount recovered was a mere fraction of the $63.5 million that was laundered over the course of that weekend.
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